Drone (EU2012)

1st Appearance	{{{appears}}}
HP	3/3/5/7
Aim	60
Defense	10
Will	Mechanized
Movement	12
Easy/Normal/Classic/Impossible

The Drone is a lightly armoured flying robotic engineer with a weak ranged attack. Their main purpose within the Alien Armada is to repair allied heavy robotic units in order to keep them gunning down your squad for as long as possible. They are nothing on their own but they are almost always found with extremely deadly Cyberdiscs and Sectopods during combat.

There is a foundry upgrade that lets you upgrade your arc throwers. The upgrade allows you to use your arc throwers to hack drone units essentially allowing you to add them to your squad for the rest of the mission. You can not use them for repairing your SHIVs but they still make good expendable scouts. They can also use a self-destruct ability in order to damage enemy units.

Tactical Advice

There isn't much to fighting Drones. They have a pretty small frame so it may be difficult hitting them, though even if you miss they really can not do much in the way of retaliation. While not particularly dangerous, they take considerable time to destroy and can end up causing injury while your squad is preoccupied with bigger threats.

Be advised that they will almost always appear alongside stronger robotic units such as Sectopods. This makes drones easy targets for rockets and grenades. Heavies with HEAT ammo in particular can destroy drones with a single grenade (on classic or below) or shredder rocket/alien grenade (on impossible). This makes it easier for the rest of your squad to focus on the heavier machines.

They will repair their accompanying Cyberdisc/Sectopod for 3 HPs each time, and seem to only ever do so for their Cyberdisc/Sectopod, and not one another, nor any other spawned Cyberdiscs/Sectopods/Drones. Most of the time, they will stay near their Cyberdisc/Sectopod, save for on Terror Missions, where their significant movement will make short work of many civilians in each turn if not quickly taken out (often while you're busy engaging their Disc/Pod). They do tend to make repairing the main unit a higher priority than attacking, though.

Hacking Mechanics & Hacked Tactics

You will need the Foundry, the Drone autopsy completed, and some of their wreckage for the Foundry Project (don't worry, you'll be destroying plenty of them), and, once all that is complete, a soldier equipped with an Arc Thrower. The biggest danger is that Drones will almost always be in the company of Cyberdiscs (which may kill the drones upon their death), or Sectopods (which if you rely on Heavies with rockets and the HEAT ability to destroy, you might destroy the drones in the process).

Unlike with capturing aliens, damaging them first is not required (and is not desirable in this case), and has a 100% success rate. Fortunately for your troopers, the range to hack is several tiles larger than an attempted stun. Once Hacked, you have full control of them for the rest of the mission, and they will effectively be counted as additional troopers (and thus, excellent for Snipers with Squadsight), for as many Drones (and Arc Thrower uses) as there are left. Hacking may be most worthwhile in Impossible difficulty, when their 7 HP may help them survive an attack or two. Getting two or more is ideal, as you can use them to heal one another indefinitely. As they can fly, their best use is as scouts/distractions, flying high above an alien; which if it tries to fire in retaliation, may have a high chance of missing the shot. Their own meager shot attack can still help whittle aliens down, and is useful to assist in corralling Berserkers. Lastly, having 1 or 2 Drones following and supporting/repairing (their repair beam has a very large range) your own S.H.I.V.s makes for a near-indestructable force, and is deliciously ironic.

They can not use cover (though you may still want to stay near it, as cover may still 'intercept' shots.) When the mission ends, they are apparently dismantled for the Weapon Fragments and Alien Alloys, and will not be available for further deployment.

Abilities:

• Self Destruct: The Drone self-detonates, dealing damage similar to frag grenade.
• Repair: The Drone can repair a damaged Sectopod or Cyberdisc, letting it stay in the fight for longer.