The ultimate drone R&D thread

[Gerion]

Here are some testing results (Fuck your drones, @Thalanor , 20 of them wrecked my corvette. Did took 10+ with it though. 5 million credits in drones deployed, 2,5 lost and destroyed a ship worth 10+ million. Nice, isnt it?):

Punch-through: Either cannon + something not-cannon, OR cannon/cannon if used against drones. You only need enough damage to punch through the shield (which are pitiful), the outer layer (armour or not) and then its crippled drones time.

Also, if you go for that, fire it manually and use the right mouse button. The left one misses 90% of the time, the right one hits more often. Dont ask me why, but its the case.
If you have swarm missiles, use a new combo for each barrel (instead of 8 barrels linked to one computer, link each barrel to a new one). Something is wrong with the target seeking of those. Feels like the computer takes 4-6 targets and then distributes its missiles against these targets. With each computer taking its own 4-6 targets, you get a much greater amount of destroyed or severely crippled drones.

Dont use turrets or your own drones when using swarm missiles. They dont really care what they target.
Keep the muzzle of the swarm missile away from the cannon, as they will automatically destroy your missiles. Same goes for drones. Either missiles or cannons. Also for microturrets and missile drones when used together: The turrets will destroy the missiles shot from the drones.

 

[Loadout]

That is interesting. At first, I thought it had to do something with your target ship being hollow (from the looks of it). However, that does not seem to matter at all. I repeated your test against a solid target made of hardened hull... well, my drones are going to get the missile output split up now. If the power malus at 4 outputs isn't too much (have yet to test).

This may be a bug though. The one-system crater in fact does total an amount of effective hp (400 per advanced armor) removed that roughly corresponds to the total missile damage. The combined EHP of total blocks removed on the left crater far exceeds 12.3k (the damage in the very first layer of armor already is around 100 blocks x 400 EHP). This may be important in estimating future hull damage of drones if it really is a bug and thus fixed sometime ( @keptick , @Argyle_Ninja ). Still, with multi-missiles you are on the safe side: bug or not, fixed or not, you will never be at a disadvantage (except the power malus of multi output).


Could someone confirm the following power cost formula for a weapon computer?
effectiveTotalCost = baseCostIfOneGroupOnly * (1 + 0.1*(numberOfGroups - 1) )
With 4 instead of 1 missile for example, a drone would need 975 instead of 750 power per block, which is a 30% increase. But multiple missiles do indeed have advantages too:
1. If their damage is rather low: They "drill" instead of zeroing the hull details of the target ship.
2. If their damage is high (not drones): They don't waste all their explosion radii on the same 20 radius sphere.


Note that focus fired achieved a considerably better performance than right-clicked, which is another indicator of weird behavior in low-damage missiles, although the latter still beats one single missile system. Also note that with LARGE missile arrays (capship, not drones), that does not apply - rightclick-fire does far more hull damage as every missile would already clear it's 20 block explosion radius of blocks.

I can confirm that formula appears to be correct.
1-amc group : 150 power
2-amc group : 330 power (165 each which is 10% higher each)
3-amc group : 540 power (180 each an additional 10% for the extra group)

This makes me wonder what the optimal spread for missiles is, would 3 evenly spaced missiles have better power output but an almost equal effective radius? if so what is the best spread pattern for missiles? square? diamond? triangle? On such a small frame I think placing the active launch tube(the one which the missile exits) at the outermost corners might be more effective than simply clustering.

Well, time to make a mini missile drone, and do some tests!

 

[Thalanor]

The best spread pattern for missiles as of testing actually seems to be to put the additional ones behind the first so that they hit the target one after the other. The drilling effects are fearsome.
@Gerion: mwahahar! Now I can only estimate how effective they are against non-anti-drone ships.

 

[Loadout]

The best spread pattern for missiles as of testing actually seems to be to put the additional ones behind the first so that they hit the target one after the other. The drilling effects are fearsome.
@Gerion: mwahahar! Now I can only estimate how effective they are against non-anti-drone ships.

Feels a little cheesy though hiding missiles behind missiles to achieve better explosions.

Pic of the spread, Left was focused, Right was unfocused.

This was 3 single missile launchers placed in a 9 wide 4 high triangle formation. Assuming each missile was more powerful you could potentially do alot more damage by unfocusing. Even on drones it appears possible with a fairly small number of launchers, to totally obliterate armored targets especially with explosive effect. Now I wonder which is better, explosive/overdrive/punch. OD missiles sound like they'd be fun though hard to handle.

Edit: Rather than make another post I'll post my OD missile findings right here!

As you can see the one on the right is OD the one on the left is an equal damage normal missile. If you can't tell what's happened the OD has caused the explosion damage to double, instead of it's normal piddly amount it's been increased to almost full damage! A larger array could possibly drill through a huge chunk of armor/systems in this manner.

Honestly, totally didn't think OD would increase the explosive oomph of the missile, damage sure but it'd still be proportional through the radius. This was totally unexpected.

 

[Keptick]

Yes @Thalanor , the missile tubes on my drone are real :P.

I'll have to refit the soul drone with all this new data (even though it's already pretty optimal according to what I read here). Replacing some thrust with shields seems like a good idea. Firepower wise, I think that it's fine already considering that only the core is left when I fire at an other drone :P. I'd use overdrive but the power storage already takes up a lot of space, so that won't work.

I'll have to take a look at my oblivion drone again, I completely obliterated a pirate station in about 30 seconds with one yesterday, I forgot how effective it was against multiple targets (could obliterate point defence systems on enemy ships). Before you ask, the current version of the ob. drone is equipped with two rapid fire missile turrets and a vertical launch lock on missile system.[DOUBLEPOST=1414424166,1414424135][/DOUBLEPOST]Honestly people, I'm very impressed with what is happening here. What started as a tech demo has grown far beyond my expectations! I don't even have to give any tips, you guys are the ones teaching me stuff now. Seriously, you all deserve a cookie.

:')

 

[Thalanor]

I must admit turrets on drones were not something I have thought about. The usual disadvantages of turrets (die fast) don't really matter when the drone dies with one hit anyways. Still there is likely a drone count where the advantages of turrets aren't visible anymore if you have 40+ individual drones out anyways :p

This gives me the idea of a "turret-sattelite drone", which has a center part dedicated to thrust, shields, and energy stuff, and 2 or 4 missile turrets as only weapons that draw their power from the core. The only weapon the core would need is a 1-block beam to make it exhibit the usual circling behavior.

 

[Loadout]

Yes @Thalanor , the missile tubes on my drone are real :p.

I'll have to refit the soul drone with all this new data (even though it's already pretty optimal according to what I read here). Replacing some thrust with shields seems like a good idea. Firepower wise, I think that it's fine already considering that only the core is left when I fire at an other drone :p. I'd use overdrive but the power storage already takes up a lot of space, so that won't work.

I'll have to take a look at my oblivion drone again, I completely obliterated a pirate station in about 30 seconds with one yesterday, I forgot how effective it was against multiple targets (could obliterate point defence systems on enemy ships). Before you ask, the current version of the ob. drone is equipped with two rapid fire missile turrets and a vertical launch lock on missile system.[DOUBLEPOST=1414424166,1414424135][/DOUBLEPOST]Honestly people, I'm very impressed with what is happening here. What started as a tech demo has grown far beyond my expectations! I don't even have to give any tips, you guys are the ones teaching me stuff now. Seriously, you all deserve a cookie.

:')

Mmmm salted tear drop cookies.. lol.

Do bobby AI's understand multiple weapon systems? mine seem to derp out and only use whatever is in the first (occupied) slot from the left. OD I think would be more effective on much smaller missiles. If you cut the number of missiles on your Soul drone by half, then use OD you can use the extra space for power. Also that thing has massive thrust <_< you could definitely cut it down. Heck I'll prolly do it for yah right now :P

~is bored waiting for wife to get outta class.

On second thought when spawning in your rack I accidentally fired an OD missile with damage pulse. PIC!

It didn't core any, but it totally wrecked about 7 of them in one shot. Oh it's only a 1/1/1 by the way ^_^

 

[Keptick]

I must admit turrets on drones were not something I have thought about. The usual disadvantages of turrets (die fast) don't really matter when the drone dies with one hit anyways. Still there is likely a drone count where the advantages of turrets aren't visible anymore if you have 40+ individual drones out anyways :p

This gives me the idea of a "turret-sattelite drone", which has a center part dedicated to thrust, shields, and energy stuff, and 2 or 4 missile turrets as only weapons that draw their power from the core. The only weapon the core would need is a 1-block beam to make it exhibit the usual circling behavior.

You literally described my drone, down to the smallest details. Except that the beam is a stop beam :P

 

[Loadout]

@keptick Results on a brief soul drone modification...

3 On the left is the stock soul drone results. Pretty much to be expected.

3 on the Right are using OD, they only have 16 total missile blocks instead of 143. Power usage is ~equal (massive either way) but the end result leaves a huge amount of space wide open for additional systems or even just a smaller drone. More shields better power, heck you can even leave the thrusters as is and not even have to worry about it.

 

[Keptick]

If the power consumption is the same then didn't you half the damage? If not, then this is awesome :P

 

[Thalanor]

Oh god I have so much fun right now. All thanks to you guys :D
I got a couple hours to design a turreted drone now; I also have a huge amount of lasagna and a beer right here by me.
This upcoming lil' drone will be a small tad larger than my other designs, but it is meant to be a rather nasty, heavy combat drone (still mass deployable with drone carriers though).

 

[Keptick]

Back in the days this thing could take on 7 or 8 isanths at once and wreck (the isanths that is). This is the first version of the drone (and the first thing I ever finished in the game):

It underwent many changes in the updates but I think that it's time for it to go back to it's original form. I loved that thing :')

Ps: Yes, that's two turrets. It absolutely demolishes other small craft (or used to). Now they could even shoot down missiles, so good luck taking those on with a swarm of missile drones.

 

[Loadout]

If the power consumption is the same then didn't you half the damage? If not, then this is awesome :p

Actually, the altered version does only 600 damage. The kicker is that the OD triples damage vs shields. So you only lost maybe 2 missiles, the remaining two however do about full damage to everything in the radius.

 

[Keptick]

Actually, the altered version does only 600 damage. The kicker is that the OD triples damage vs shields. So you only lost maybe 2 missiles, the remaining two however do about full damage to everything in the radius.

Two out of four missiles lost is a lot.... Also, did you mean damage per second? Because the original DPS is 700. If you meant burst damage then it's just horrible (10500 to 600).

Overdrive triples damage against everything btw :p. Oh, and there's a bug with splash damage doing a lot more damage to separate hit entities (such as my drones on the rack).

 

[Loadout]

Two out of four missiles lost is a lot.... Also, did you mean damage per second? Because the original DPS is 700. If you meant burst damage then it's just horrible (10500 to 600).

Overdrive triples damage against everything btw :p. Oh, and there's a bug with splash damage doing a lot more damage to separate hit entities (such as my drones on the rack).

Well triple to everything is great, <S>but I don't think that's quite how it works, my damage indicators are only tripled on shields unless</S> it's a display bug... Hate those soooo much...

1800 per missile and not really a loss at all. :p You can see above the difference is minimal. You actually lose 1 out of four against your shields anyways so the comparison is actually 3 missiles to 2. Adding in one more missile block, each, will correct that to 3:3, the above was just a (rapid) example.

The splash I referred too is per entity, not separate. Take a look above at the glass demo, you'll see that the explosion comparison of a similar damage OD vs Standard with equal damage characteristics is way different. The OD clearly distributes it's damage more smoothly over the same area with only the edges of the blast radii receiving ~similar damage. Admittedly though against cramped docked entities the radius itself did probably increase slightly, although the radius isn't what I was getting at.

Edit: -REBOOTED- display indicators were bugging out. Haven't the foggiest why but oh well. It is indeed triple the damage against blocks as well as shields, which means it's 1800 per missile. This also means because it's 3x more powerful you only need a 1/3 as many blocks so save your space!

 

[Keptick]

>_>

Do you mean 600 damage per missile before the overdrive multiplier? Because the shield damage is very important against stuff like cruisers. I'll have to do some testing when I get home cause I'm not sure that I understand what's going on.

 

[Loadout]

>_>

Do you mean 600 damage per missile before the overdrive multiplier? Because the shield damage is very important against stuff like cruisers. I'll have to do some testing when I get home cause I'm not sure that I understand what's going on.

Yeah it was a display bug. It's actually 1800 per missile. The 600 was before the 3x multiplier that wasn't showing up.

 

[Keptick]

hmmmm ok, that makes more sense. I might be able to boost it back to the original damage by using more power storage and still have some space left

 

[Loadout]

hmmmm ok, that makes more sense. I might be able to boost it back to the original damage by using more power storage and still have some space left

Looking at the numbers I don't think that's even needed. So i'm trying to nail down exactly what's going on with OD... I have the following evidence and some conclusions...

150 two block missile... Add OD it displays 300...

against Hulls this does 900 damage...
against Shields this just did 2700 damage...

so... that's 9x damage to shields and 3x damage to hulls ON top of the double damage it already gives you. Each of those missiles before was doing about 600 x 9 = 5400 shield damage. @_@ OD is seriously OP.

 

[Keptick]

You mean that it's incredibly bugged :P . OD is just supposed to triple raw damage while increasing the power consumption by a factor of 6.