The ultimate drone R&D thread

[Spartan-089]

so, I did some drone VS drone testing with CyberTao . 50 oblivion drones (mine) VS 200 Mk3 drones (his). It was just epic XD

This is pretty much what the final round of Starside B&S looked like. Drones ultimately prevailed albeit narrowly and due in part to situational interference. Reading through this thread is an inspiration, you guys have really pushed little "Bobby" to the limits. However im still aprehensive about drone carriers due high maintenance (continually replacing drones/racks), lag storm caused by drone combat, and sometimes glitchy deployment methods.

 

[Loadout]

... However im still aprehensive about drone carriers due high maintenance (continually replacing drones/racks), lag storm caused by drone combat, and sometimes glitchy deployment methods.

Don't be, Carriers are actually Low on the maintenance spectrum. Consider the following...

A) Drone carrier holding 100 drones on 4 large racks.

vs

B) Battleship with no drones but several turrets and equal mass compared to the carrier + drones.

Let's look at a battle involving these two, although not necessarily against each other. Both fight and win and now the victor (you) have to repair your ship(s).

A) The carrier will have taken minimal damage, if not directly in combat, which carriers should never be. Admittedly though the drones are either all dead or mostly dead, the racks can be salvaged and overall you need to replace the lost drones. Which is costly but considering the following....

B) Your battleship has hull damage and probably some systems damage. You have two options here, either
1. Replace the parts individually wherever they need it.
2. Tear apart the whole ship grab another blueprint and rebuild it.

It may take less parts to do the battleship part, but until you grab all those resources your stuck with whatever ship you've got lying about. Meanwhile the carrier is still intact and only waiting for some drones to be replaced. It may even still have some serious combat ability!

So carriers are actually the better option on the maintenance department.

Lag storm issues? try improving your ram used for starmade, or using larger and fewer drones, in short, know your limits on drones. I prefer my heavy drones as they are very effective at any range group. Not to mention highly damaging, and can be fielded in fewer numbers than my nano drones without any loss of efficiency.

Glitchy deployment methods can be dealt with by actually re-designing. Most deployment methods here are the result of crazy ideas that were honed and refined over many iterations until we found something that worked. Honestly it's all trial and error, you'll never get rid of the glitchyness unless you keep trying. =)

So go ahead and make a carrier already, what are you waiting for? :p

 

[Keptick]

Don't be, Carriers are actually Low on the maintenance spectrum. Consider the following...

A) Drone carrier holding 100 drones on 4 large racks.

vs

B) Battleship with no drones but several turrets and equal mass compared to the carrier + drones.

Let's look at a battle involving these two, although not necessarily against each other. Both fight and win and now the victor (you) have to repair your ship(s).

A) The carrier will have taken minimal damage, if not directly in combat, which carriers should never be. Admittedly though the drones are either all dead or mostly dead, the racks can be salvaged and overall you need to replace the lost drones. Which is costly but considering the following....

B) Your battleship has hull damage and probably some systems damage. You have two options here, either
1. Replace the parts individually wherever they need it.
2. Tear apart the whole ship grab another blueprint and rebuild it.

It may take less parts to do the battleship part, but until you grab all those resources your stuck with whatever ship you've got lying about. Meanwhile the carrier is still intact and only waiting for some drones to be replaced. It may even still have some serious combat ability!

So carriers are actually the better option on the maintenance department.

Lag storm issues? try improving your ram used for starmade, or using larger and fewer drones, in short, know your limits on drones. I prefer my heavy drones as they are very effective at any range group. Not to mention highly damaging, and can be fielded in fewer numbers than my nano drones without any loss of efficiency.

Glitchy deployment methods can be dealt with by actually re-designing. Most deployment methods here are the result of crazy ideas that were honed and refined over many iterations until we found something that worked. Honestly it's all trial and error, you'll never get rid of the glitchyness unless you keep trying. =)

So go ahead and make a carrier already, what are you waiting for? :p

Wow... I never realized that xD. Replacing dead turrets on that battleship is also infinitely more painful than replacing drone racks.

 

[Spartan-089]

So go ahead and make a carrier already, what are you waiting for? :p

I'm waiting on you to release yours so I can find out the secrets of carrier design

 

[Mered4]

I'm waiting on you to release yours so I can find out the secrets of carrier design

*leans back*

He knows my plan.

How disturbing.

 

[Loadout]

Until I finish tweaking the Savannah Light Drone Carrier I do have a slightly older model you can play around with. It should show you some of the basics as I was working them out. Actually comparing that and the newer carrier might be quite informative. =)

Dune MAC edition.

Edit: While thinking about it, the Savannah just needs more stuffing in it, but heres the current stats... subject to change...

8k mass
400k+ Energy regen
56k+ shield regen
13 cannon-beam-punch weapons at 1:1:1
3 Beams... older weapons, not sure what imma do with em yet...

 

[Spartan-089]

Until I finish tweaking the Savannah Light Drone Carrier I do have a slightly older model you can play around with. It should show you some of the basics as I was working them out. Actually comparing that and the newer carrier might be quite informative. =)

Dune MAC edition.

Edit: While thinking about it, the Savannah just needs more stuffing in it, but heres the current stats... subject to change...

8k mass
400k+ Energy regen
56k+ shield regen
13 cannon-beam-punch weapons at 1:1:1
3 Beams... older weapons, not sure what imma do with em yet...

If you have an unfinished version of the Savanah I would take that as I'd probably rip it apart (gently) anyway to study it. I've already downloaded the dune before but it isn't exactly what I'm looking for in a carrier.

 

[Loadout]

If you have an unfinished version of the Savanah I would take that as I'd probably rip it apart (gently) anyway to study it. I've already downloaded the dune before but it isn't exactly what I'm looking for in a carrier.

I'm not sure how I feel about sharing an unfinished work but I can't say no to fans ^_^

Savannah Prototype Savannah Mk1

That's the version I'm working on this morning so it is the most up to date. I'll be finishing the back end and then adding in some more jump drives where the forward beams are. I decided late late LATE last night to add in some supporting tools so the ship was able to function more effectively pre/post combat. Should be up later today.. hopefully.

Edit: Just finished the mk1 version of the Savannah Light Drone Carrier (LDC). Already have a few revisions in mind for a mk2 version as well, and am in the middle of testing whether or not they're actually possible. Will update you all eventually with progress =) In the meantime those who haven't seen the Gif with lights can take a gander...

 

[incorruptable]

Don't know if anyone made this proposition when it comes to drones, but what about Anti-Missile drones? Specifically: Drones that are just equipped with a light AMC weapon and high thrust capabilities with higher shielding (due to not needing any sort of other weaponry). They'd have a weakness of anything that's trying to target them, but because they're not actively engaging in combat, they shouldn't be targeted by anything more than swarm missiles or lock-on missiles, which they would be taking down anyway.

 

[Loadout]

Don't know if anyone made this proposition when it comes to drones, but what about Anti-Missile drones? Specifically: Drones that are just equipped with a light AMC weapon and high thrust capabilities with higher shielding (due to not needing any sort of other weaponry). They'd have a weakness of anything that's trying to target them, but because they're not actively engaging in combat, they shouldn't be targeted by anything more than swarm missiles or lock-on missiles, which they would be taking down anyway.

I tried something along these lines a while back and they do shoot down most missiles. The problems I had were fairly simple, basic cannon drones were just as effective and they also targeted missiles albeit indirectly. See my Gryllos Drone or Ju Ga Drone for examples, both use cannons to swat missiles and do damage to enemy ships.

Basically it's better to just give them cannons and have them go at it normally, they'll more than likely destroy most missiles they encounter anywho. No real need for a dedicated AMS drone. =)

 

[Keptick]

I tried something along these lines a while back and they do shoot down most missiles. The problems I had were fairly simple, basic cannon drones were just as effective and they also targeted missiles albeit indirectly. See my Gryllos Drone or Ju Ga Drone for examples, both use cannons to swat missiles and do damage to enemy ships.

Basically it's better to just give them cannons and have them go at it normally, they'll more than likely destroy most missiles they encounter anywho. No real need for a dedicated AMS drone. =)

Yea, that's exactly how the needle drone works: It indirectly shoots down missiles being shot at it.

However, I modified a skoomdrone into a high-tech shuttle by adding two anti-missile turrets and removing the passive push system (and adding a jump drive). It actually shoots down missiles pretty well.

 

[SkaireKrough]

keptic said" removing the passive push system"

OK, maybe I missed an earlier post about why you have a passive push system installed on a drone.

Let me make some assumptions about that and please correct me if I'm wrong.
1. Last I knew A.I. would not use passive systems, so I'm guessing that they are logic controlled.
2. A.I. has a tendency to back away from hostiles and shoot from their maximum weapon range, push system attempts to compensate by pushing them closer to the enemy so that their weapons are more effective.

 

[Keptick]

OK, maybe I missed an earlier post about why you have a passive push system installed on a drone.

Let me make some assumptions about that and please correct me if I'm wrong.
1. Last I knew A.I. would not use passive systems, so I'm guessing that they are logic controlled.
2. A.I. has a tendency to back away from hostiles and shoot from their maximum weapon range, push system attempts to compensate by pushing them closer to the enemy so that their weapons are more effective.

The skoomdrone uses a push pulse system to disable enemy ship control. The passive push system is indeed tied to logic and is meant to make the flight path of the drone a lot more erratic. And to make it close in on the enemy properly.

 

[Thalanor]

Has someone been able to conduct any science on drone effectiveness in the new patch yet? There are a couple of points that matter now.

1. Double shielding. Since drones will never have alot of shields (even when rather tanky for their size), this change will benefit the two main targets of a drone - large turrets and large ships. For drones, this means that the alpha damage component will be less effective than before, and more drones will die before the defenses are penetrated.

2. Better armor. This change is actually interesting for drones. A pre-update drone modified to feature a layer of advanced armor in the front (possible on even the smallest of drones) is now considerably more tanky than before against turret fire. A suitably large drone may even actually withstand a punch blast, even when hit from a vector not protected by the faction module.

 

[Loadout]

Has someone been able to conduct any science on drone effectiveness in the new patch yet? There are a couple of points that matter now.

1. Double shielding. Since drones will never have alot of shields (even when rather tanky for their size), this change will benefit the two main targets of a drone - large turrets and large ships. For drones, this means that the alpha damage component will be less effective than before, and more drones will die before the defenses are penetrated.

2. Better armor. This change is actually interesting for drones. A pre-update drone modified to feature a layer of advanced armor in the front (possible on even the smallest of drones) is now considerably more tanky than before against turret fire. A suitably large drone may even actually withstand a punch blast, even when hit from a vector not protected by the faction module.

I've been doing quite a bit of testing on this actually so let me add in my notes so far...

1. Increased Shields.

This point is actually more beneficial for drones than their intended targets. Whereas before the drones shields were quite small, now they're generally large enough to take a hit from their archenemy which is low(ish) damage swarm missiles. Actually my Kabuto drones are sitting at nice solid 20k shields, which is perfectly reasonable for their size.

On the flip side though, alpha damage weapons are now more or less obsolete. Seeing as how it's now twice as difficult to blast through an enemies shields rapid fire weapons are much more effective. Case in point is my Rumble bee drones, originally they had lock-on missiles. These did great alpha damage every 15 seconds, but given how quickly shields go from 6% reduced shield regen back to 100%, that bonus capacity is now a huge problem for these. So I went with long range cannons instead, the 4 second recharge is vastly quicker and offers considerably better punishment in my tests so far.

Long story short the shorter recharge of cannon-beams(@1:1) is much better for reducing recharge of enemy shields than the Missile beam(@1:0). 4 seconds beats 15 seconds.

Most of my drones will be updated with this concept in mind.

2.Better armor: this helps in such a minor way(standard armor or below) that I can't actually see it becoming something terribly useful. That said having cheaper advanced armor is tempting given how much cheaper it will be to use it in mass production. I haven't got much data on this, so it is kind of a toss up. Once I have made a new version of my kabuto i'll experiment a bit with advanced armor vs basic hull.

 

[Keptick]

Loadout A reason why 100% missile drones might seem ineffective is because missiles don't trigger the "under fire" shield regen debuff. Not too sure if it's a bug or intentional though.

A solution is to add a single cannon to a couple of drones (or all of them), in order to keep the target's regen under fire.

 

[Loadout]

After a lot of tinkering I came up with a new Drone, the wisp, and also a new way to classify drone size!

It was so simple it has been smacking me in the face every time I build a drone rack. The size of the drone is ~= to the number of docking enhancers you need for it.

So I built a quick scale to determine how big a drone is...

• 0-1 Enhancers - Nano drone
• 2-4 Enhancers - Standard/Medium size
• 5-8 Enhancers - Heavy Drone
• 9+ Enhancers - Corvette Drone Size

It's by no means set in stone, but it does scale quite nicely so far. That is, most drones that fall into the same category are roughly equal in terms of strength. Except Corvette Drones, those are a total wildcard... mostly cause I've yet to build one.

Anywho, figured I'd share this idea, as my own labels seemed pretty ambiguous even to me. Now off to build a Corvette drone!

Pics of my latest medium drone for those interested...

 

[AtraUnam]

Hey on the topic of drone racks being far less painful to replace than battleship turrets... has anyone considered a battleship turret rack?

 

[Mered4]

Hey on the topic of drone racks being far less painful to replace than battleship turrets... has anyone considered a battleship turret rack?

I do this for my turrets, but not in the way you are thinking. All turrets on one ship -> save -> load in survival -> drive ship around battleship to load turrets -> eat *rack* for blocks.

 

[Keptick]

Hey on the topic of drone racks being far less painful to replace than battleship turrets... has anyone considered a battleship turret rack?

Yea, someone was talking about using point defense turret plates since those get shot down the most in combat. I think that it was @azeriah. It's a pretty good idea imo, since replacing PD turrets is a gigantic pain.