Re: Jst droneing on
 

Drones are very good for defending warp points. When the enemy warps the point defence of the enemy has usually only one turn to kill your drones before the drones ram.

To make drones even better try making them different. A drone with a lot of armor can take a lot of damage. Drones have a built in +50% defence bonus so with EMC the defend bonus gets quite large. One drone takes out at least one mine so they can be used to sweep small mine fields.

In current Version (1.84) there is a bug in drones that makes them warp one at a time so attacking through a warp point is useless.

Re: Jst droneing on
 

As one who's never used drones before, these tips make it sound very tempting to do so in the future. I think I'll try drones out the next time I start a game.

Re: Jst droneing on
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">This makes for a great planet buster http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: Jst droneing on
 

I have come to really love DRONES. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

I have learned the hard way how to use them, and now that I know, I really like them. I love glassing AI worlds from two sectors away. (Damn PDC's) http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon9.gif

Re: Jst droneing on
 

By the way, if you want to put stuff other than warheads on your drones (like say nullspace cannons), it would be a good idea to change their strategy from the default of "ram" to something more useful - no sense seeing your expensive drones fire once, then ram their expensive fancy weapons into the enemy http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Re: Jst droneing on
 

The largest part of the expense for drones is the engines. These can be more than half of the cost of a drone! A small mod to the game can make drones much more practical. Either create a special, cheaper engine just for drones or make a mount that reduces the cost of regular engines for drones.

Re: Jst droneing on
 

Well, I have to say thta my opinion of drones has seriously changed from my more recent experiences. They can be amazing if used as support fire or in large (10+) numbers as anti-fleet or anti-planet IPBM's.

One system that hasen't been mentioned in this thread that I've found really strong is to mix drones with fighters for an attack. A few drones and a decently sized wing of small fighters can really solve almost any home-defence problem and it costs 0 maitenance as a world defence.

Basically, the enemy gets put in a prisoners delimma where they get a turn to either fire on the drones (thus leaving the fighters unscathed) or shoot at fighters and absorb the drones. Either way, they're pretty hosed and the cost in building 8 small drones and 80 small fighters is less then the 3 dreadnaughts they can defeat.

Also, these little buggers really shine in limited resource games, which I'm starting to play for logistic reasons. (much more intence, and you really find a use for those storage facilities when you have to make all the resources count!) Can the AI handle limited resources? I haven't gotten to far into the game yet and I'm worried that he'll produce himself to death.

Chris Woods

Re: Jst droneing on
 

Drones are fun ! Suppose you are a psychic race fighting another psychic race. Both of you obviously like AS http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif Now, he send a fleet of AS ships and you intercept it with a swarm of drones with AS... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Re: Jst droneing on
 

My favorite drone tactic (which I've mentioned on the board before) is to build bases with drone launchers inside my allies' territory (preferably in storm or nebula systems where they might not be detected); then, when the inevitable war occurs, launch waves of drones against the new enemies' fleets and colonies. Since there's no maintenance cost for drones, there's no real penalty for having a huge stockpile waiting around for 10-20 years before the war starts (except for maintenance cost on the launcher base, but bases get a 50% maintenance reduction anyway, and it's still cheaper than maintaining multiple fleets); and, if you're only putting warheads on the drones, the only components that might become obsolete are the engines, which is a fairly minor problem.

Re: Jst droneing on
 

DirectorTsaarx:
This goes right along with my statement that drones are really only a strategically sound option when there is a long period of peaceful buildup. Otherwise, you get much more return for building ships than you do drones.