Subset Games Forum

My favourite aspect of FTL is the drones - the idea of sitting back and monitoring your ship while your drones clean up the enemy ships really appeals to me.

One frustrating thing is the small amount of room for using drones - with only 3 drone slots, I either have to severely gimp my attacking power for the sake of anti boarding, defense or repair drones, or i can forgo all of those in favour of a swarm of anti ship or beam drones that leave me like a sitting duck - I appreciate its about striking a balance to create a quality ship build but would anybody be able to create a mod or point me in the direction of one that would improve one this?

For instance sacrificing weapon slots for drone slots or having dedicated weapon, defense or utility drone slots?

Dedicated drone slots are impossible to achieve as of now. The reason why most ships generally don't exceed 3 slots is because with any more than that the slot graphics start to bug and overlap with other elements of the UI. Though if you reduce the number of weapon slots to allow more drone slots to fit, it should be completely fine. Actually, I'd like to see a 2-weapon slot 5-drone slot ship... Would be pretty interesting.

Either way, the only good drone mod that I know of is DronesPlus - and I really recommend it, it's great, if a bit OP (ion drone, seriously, that thing is going to be the end of you if the enemy has it)
Too bad we don't have any more of those.

You can have more than 3 drone slots, however the UI was not designed to support this, meaning it will be rather un-pretty.

As for drones themselves, they may be customised to do more or less anything a regular weapon can do - firing missiles to ion, to being a fire or anti-personell specialist, shield piercing etc.

Defence drones can be configured pretty much only in terms of fire rate and accuracy (and orbit speed, though this is purely aesthetic).

Boarding/antiperson drones can only be modified in terms of power use (and flight speed for boarding drones).

edit: sniped by karto.
On the subject of weapons, the game was only designed for 3, 4 weapon slots, meaning you *can* give a ship two, but it will use the 4-weapon UI frame, which is again not pretty. Better off just having ~6 drone slots and no weapon system at all, if you want to take this route. Just don't forget a drone recovery arm!

6 drone slots does sound appealing, just as an alternative playstyle - pretty much anything the ships weapons can do, the drones can do (give or take a few situations of the more powerful weapons)
However - i have no knowledge of modding, nor the time to do it myself. I guess ill wait till the game has been out longer and somebody releases a better drone mod.

Ill check out DronePlus - cheers guys!

I've designed and tested 4-drone ships. The results are mixed. On the one hand you never have the power to use all your attack drones, but on the other you can easily easily switch drones based on power availability or system damage. If the Drone Control takes damage for example, you can use two attack MkI drones rather than one MkI and one MkII.

But the real upside of having 4 or more slots is that you can keep not only a defense drone handy at all times but also a hull repair drone, if you're fortunate enough to buy one. Even that is rarely anything but a luxury.

I think one of the strengths of drones is the versatility you can achieve in combination with your augments. Providing none of the drones get destroyed (can anything actually destroy defensive/offensive drones or are they just shut off?) you can literally flick your respective drone systems on and off depending on your power availability. Not to mention a defense drone mark 1 negates the need for high level engines, meaning a large chunk of power can be channelled into sheilds and attack drones.
For Instance having an attack mk 2, an attack mk 1, a defense and a hull repair equipped going into the fight. Lead with attack mk 1, defense and hull repair. If your attack drone manages to damage their weapons systems or your not taking any damage, flick off either the defense/repair and turn on the attack mk2.

Im aware its not the most effective method, it just appeals to my playstyle. Attrition, slowly wearing ships down while i keep myself well guarded and topped up. The rebel flagship is a different matter entirely though... boarding drones x3 anybody?

Def.drone shoots down incoming boarding drones too.

Eagle you'd know the answer to this - Ive seen mods that expand the potential for more power bars for weapons/shields, enabling more offensive/defensive orientated ship builds. Would the same thing be capable with drone power? being able to run the more powerful drones at the cost of weapon power would be pretty sweet.

You can increase the system power above 8; the UI is not designed with this so it won't look pretty in some places/windows.

Is it possible to create a weapon that can spawn drones at the cost of drone parts (instead of missiles)?