A 4 square Drone Control room
A 2 Square Drone Control room
The Drone Control System powers and operates two to three Drones. Drones perform various tasks such as attacking enemy ships and crew, defending your ship and crew, and repairing your ship. Drone schematics are slotted into the drone control system from the equipment screen and can then be deployed by powering them, though only one drone may be deployed for each schematic. Most ships will have slots for two drone schematics; the exceptions are all Engi Cruisers, and the Simo-H which have 3 slots. Each drone requires one to four power to operate depending on the schematic and powering up the slot the schematic occupies will activate the respective drone; if that drone is not deployed, a drone part will be spent to deploy a copy of that drone, and a destroyed drone can be redeployed after a short delay. The drone system can be upgraded to handle up to eight bars of power, though the current level limits the number of drones you can use. The drone system only comes pre-installed on Engi cruisers, the Cerenkov, The Basilisk and Simo-H, other ships must first buy the system at a Store for 70 to 85 scrap whereupon the system will start with 2 bars of power and come with a free drone schematic.
Overview
Powers all of the ship's drones. Drones are automated robots that perform tasks like attacking enemy ships or repairing systems.
- Powers all of the ship's drones.
- Drones are automated robots that each perform a different task.
- Activating a drone is done in a similar way as activating weapons, by clicking on or pressing the key (5-7).
- Activating a drone will power it and, if the drone is not already deployed will spend one drone part to deploy the drone
- The drone will stay active until it is destroyed, its system is too damaged to power it or you deactivate it.
- External and boarding drones are lost when jumping to a new system and have to be redeployed at each new location or encounter, though a Drone Recovery Arm lets you recover the drone parts of external drones
- Crew drones stay on the ship and only need to be redeployed when destroyed.
- Upgrading lets you power more drones.
- Most ships have 2 slots for Drone Schematics, though a few ships have 3.
- Drones that fly around a ship can be shot down by enemy fire if they are in direct line of fire. Your weapons cannot hit your own drones.
- Crew and boarding drones can be destroyed by hostile crewmen
Guide and Tactics
Like with weapons, more powerful drones require more power which can limit the ability to have all drones active at the same time, though this is mitigated slightly by the fact most ships only have 2 slots so can manage to have both drones powered even of the most power hungry variants once the system is fully upgraded. Furthermore not all drones are useful in the same situations, so a fully upgraded drone control may be more of a luxury to soak damage than a requirement to actually use all of your drones. Some drones such as the Hull Repair Drone are also useful out of combat so can even be stored in the cargo bay and only fitted as needed. As it can recover some of the drone parts used in a battle, a drone recovery arm is a very useful Augmentation for any ship that relies on drones heavily. Additionally, the Drone Reactor Booster that comes fitted to the Vortex and can be installed on other ships from The Engi Virus event; it is somewhat useful since crew drones move more slowly than regular crew, but is still somewhat replaceable since crew drones spend more time standing around. The Defense Scrambler fitted to the Tetragon and purchasable at a store is an awesome augment as it prevents defensive drones from locking on to anything letting your combat drones orbit unopposed and for Hacking and boarding drones to land in ships with defense drones orbiting; irreplaceable.
Blue Options
Some equipment opens additional Options during certain events. While the Drone Control System itself does not open any options, the various different drones do.
Anti-Personnel Drone
Beam Drone
Boarding Drone
Defense Drone
Hull Repair Drone
Repair Drone
- Damaged Shield Ship
- Fire on Small Research Station
- Mantis Ships Battle for Rock Freighter
- Small Asteroid Belt Distress Beacon
Drone Schematics
A drone schematic is required to operate a drone, and there are four types: Boarding Drones, Combat Drones, Crew Drones and Defensive Drones.
Boarding Drones
Tip: Boarding Drones require 1 drone part to deploy for each new enemy. They will board the enemy ship and attack as long as they are powered.
When deployed, Boarding Drones fly to an enemy ship, breach the hull and attack crew and systems inside. They are unaffected by fires or oxygen depletion nor ion blasts. They pass through regular shields and, unlike missiles or bombs, they cannot miss.
However, Boarding Drones can be shot down by defensive drones (though an Anti-Combat Drone will only momentarily delay Boarding Drones). Zoltan shields will block boarding drones until removed. Drones can't board a cloaked ship until it decloaks (if deployed against a cloaked ship they will orbit till that ship decloaks). And like all drones, the player has no direct control of them.
Boarding Drone
Breaches through the enemy hull and wreaks havoc. Awesome.
- Passes through any level of regular shields.
- Boards enemy ships and attacks enemy crewmen.
- Health: 150
- Speed: 18
- Power: 3
- Rarity: 4
- Cost: 70
Boarding Drone (Boss)
Breaches through the enemy hull and wreaks havoc. Awesome.
- Rebel Flagship's special boarding drone. It is unique to the Flagship.
- Not recognized as an option in the Giant Alien Spiders event, likely all other Blue options as well.
- Passes through any level of regular shields.
- Health: 150
- Speed: 18
- Power: 2
- Cost: 70 (cannot be bought nor found)
Ion Intruder
Breaches through the enemy hull and randomly ionizes systems.
- Passes through any level of regular shields.
- Periodically emits an ion blast that does ion damage to a system and stuns enemy crew then moves to a different, non-ioned system.
- Health: 125
- Speed: 18
- Power: 3
- Rarity: 4
- Cost: 65
- Advanced Edition only.
Combat Drones
Tip: Combat Drones require 1 drone part to deploy at each encounter and, if destroyed in battle, 1 more drone part each time redeployed. They will attack the enemy as long as they are powered and can freely be switched on and off.
Combat drones orbit the enemy ship and attack it at regular intervals choosing targets on their own. They can be destroyed if they happen to fly into the path of enemy weapons fire or asteroids, but they can only be intentionally attacked by the Anti-Combat Drone. Players may intentionally shoot enemy combative drones by carefully timing shots and positioning their ship's laser, ion, or missile weapons to intercept.
Though combat drones cannot be controlled and often will choose undesirable targets (such as empty rooms), their increased rate of fire in comparison to ship weapons causes them to do incredibly rapid damage to the enemy hull when shields are down. If you are planning to use a combat drone strategy, make sure you have some way of quickly disabling, destroying, or overwhelming the enemy shields so your drones can make short work of the enemy ship. Missile, flak weapons, and the hacking system are good for this.
Combat Drone Mark I
Powerful drone that continually attacks the enemy ship.
- Continually attacks the enemy ship with a single laser blast; slower than normal shield recharge.
- Can be given for free upon installation of Drone Control system.
- Speed: 15
- Power: 2
- Rarity: 2
- Cost: 50
Combat Drone Mark II
Powerful drone that continually attacks the enemy ship. Moves and shoots faster than Mark I.
- Increased rate of fire and speed of maneuvering - sufficient to evade the Anti-Combat Drone.
- Speed: 28
- Power: 4
- Rarity: 5
- Cost: 75
Anti-Ship Beam Drone I
Combat Drone that repeatedly attacks with a small beam weapon.
- Uses a small beam weapon to continually attack the enemy ship. While fast and 100% accurate, the beam cannot penetrate shields at all.
- Beam length: 20 (0.4 tile diagonally)
- Speed: 15
- Power: 2
- Rarity: 3
- Cost: 50
Anti Ship Beam Drone II
Combat drone that repeatedly attacks with a larger beam weapon.
- Moves a bit slower than Mark I, but has a slightly longer beam length, so it can often hit 2 rooms. Also does 2 damage to a Zoltan Shield, compared to 1 for Mark I.
- Beam length: 40 (0.9 tile diagonally)
- Speed: 11
- Power: 3
- Rarity: 5
- Cost: 60
- Advanced Edition only.
Anti-Ship Fire Drone
Combat drone that repeatedly attacks with a small beam weapon that lights rooms on fire.
- A variant of the beam drone that uses a Fire Beam equivalent to ignite specific rooms.
- Beam length: 10 (0.2 tile diagonally)
- Speed: 12
- Power: 3
- Rarity: 4
- Cost: 50
- Advanced Edition only.
Crew Drones
Tip: Crew Drones require 1 drone to deploy, but will not need to be deployed again until destroyed. They stay on ship and help your crew as long as they are powered.
Crew drones are deployed on your own ship and act like AI controlled crew members. They are unaffected by low oxygen, immune to fire, and similarly to your crew take no effect from ion blasts.
When not needed they will return to the drone bay where they will be repaired (similarly to MedBay) so long as the drone system is powered. They are typically slower moving than crew but the Drone Reactor Booster increases the movement speed of these drones.
Anti-Personnel Drone
Will seek out and attempt to destroy any intruders on-board your ship.
- Attacks random hostile boarding crews, but moves slower than default crew movement speed.
- Does not suffocate, ideal for facing Lanius intruders or Boarding Drones.
- Fireproof.
- Unaffected by ion blasts.
- Health: 150
- Power: 2
- Rarity: 2
- Cost: 35
System Repair Drone
Will seek out damaged systems and repair them automatically.
- Repairs damaged systems, but moves slower than default crew movement speed.
- Gives System and Sub-System rooms priority, repairing rooms in the order that they were damaged.
- Does not suffocate, making it useful for repairing breaches or rooms that have no oxygen.
- Fireproof.
- Ignores enemy boarders.
- Can be given for free upon installation of Drone Control system.
- Power: 1
- Rarity: 1
- Cost: 30
Hull Repair Drone
Automatically repairs 3-5 damage to your hull. Drone part is consumed once it finishes.
- Despite being counted as a crew drone in game, the Hull Repair Drone operates uniquely.
- When deployed the Hull repair drone will move around outside your ship and repair a few (3 - 5) hull points before self destructing
- Being external, it can be destroyed by stray fire.
- Requires a drone part for each new deployment.
- Particularly helpful for fighting the Rebel Flagship, as you may not be able to jump to a repair station between stages. You can simply keep the repair drone schematic in storage during the fight, freeing up space for more useful drones, and equip it only to perform repairs between stages.
- Speed: 20
- Power: 2
- Rarity: 4
- Cost: 85
Defensive Drones
Tip: Defensive Drones require 1 drone part to deploy at each new location. they will defend your ship as long as they are powered.
Defensive drones orbit your own ship and shoot down asteroids, enemy weapons fire and some drones. Unless destroyed, they can be recovered with the Drone Recovery Arm augment upon jumping.
It is possible for defensive drones to miss their target letting the occasional shot get through. Like all drones, their targeting is not player controlled, so their target selection and timing may prove sub-optimal. They also require approximately a second to acquire a target after being deployed or reactivated; powering up as soon as an enemy missile launches is sufficient.
Defense Drone Mark I
Shoots down incoming missiles, asteroids, and flak debris.
- Shoots down incoming missiles, hacking and boarding drones, individual flak debris, and asteroids with its laser.
- Can be given for free upon installation of Drone Control system.
- Cooldown: 1 second
- Speed: 5
- Power: 2
- Rarity: 1
- Cost: 50
Defense Drone Mark II
It fires faster than the Mark I and can also shoot down incoming lasers
- Shoots down incoming missiles, hacking and boarding drones, ion blasts, individual flak debris, asteroids, and lasers.
- Cooldown: 0.88 seconds
- Speed: 7
- Power: 3
- Rarity: 3
- Cost: 70
Defense Drone Mark II (Boss)
Shoots faster than Mark I and can also shoot down incoming lasers.
- Unlike its name suggests, the Rebel Flagship doesn't use this drone. (anymore?)
- Likely unusable during Blue options.
- Shoots down incoming missiles, hacking and boarding drones, ion blasts, individual flak debris, asteroids, and lasers.
- Cooldown: 0.75 seconds
- Speed: 7
- Power: 2
- Cost: 75 (cannot be bought nor found)
Anti-Combat Drone
Stuns combat drones attacking your ship.
- Armed with an ion weapon, this drone targets and stuns Combat, Hacking, and Boarding drones.
- Speed: 5
- Power: 1
- Rarity: 1
- Cost: 35
- Advanced Edition only.
Shield Overcharger
Creates single Supershield barrier periodically.
- Every 8 seconds, one bar of supershields is applied over shielding up to the maximum of 5 bars. Every layer of supershield slows the generation of the next layer by approximately 3 seconds.
- Shields overcharged by this drone return to normal after jumping away from the last location it was active.
- Speed: 5
- Power: 3
- Rarity: 4
- Cost: 60
- Advanced Edition only.
Shield Overcharger +
Creates single Supershield barrier periodically. This modified schematic requires 1 less power.
- Variant of the Shield Overcharger that only comes equipped on Simo-H.
- Every 8 seconds, one bar of supershields is applied over shielding up to the maximum of 5 bars. Every layer of supershield slows the generation of the next layer by approximately 3 seconds.
- Shields overcharged by this drone return to normal after jumping away from the last location it was active.
- Speed: 5
- Power: 2
- Cost: 60 (cannot be bought nor found)
- Advanced Edition only.