Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Turret and missile ships have it easy. They can resupply from anywhere - a friend's jetcan, the wreck of a defeated enemy - and they have plenty of upgrade options thanks to low-power enhancement modules like gyrostabilizers.

It's harder for drone users; lose your drones and you're screwed until you're next at a station, POS, or maintenance ship - all things you won't find anywhere near the front lines. And that's assuming you've got spares when you get there.

My proposal is this: a selection of modules, gear and mechanics giving drone ships better resupply and upgrade capabilities.

Modules

Category: Drones > Drone Upgrades > Drone Handlers

Small Drone Handler
Medium slot
Reqs: Drones II, Scout Drone Operation II, Drone Maintenance II [new]
Allows the transfer of Small and Mining drones from your cargo bay to another ship's drone bay.

Medium Drone Handler
Medium slot
Reqs: Drones III, Combat Drone Operation III, Scout Drone Operation II, Drone Maintenance III [new]
Allows the transfer of Medium, Small, and Mining drones from your cargo bay to another ship's drone bay.

Large Drone Handler
Medium slot
Reqs: Drones IV, Heavy Drone Operation IV, Combat Drone Operation III, Scout Drone Operation II, Drone Maintenance IV [new]
Allows the transfer of Heavy, Medium, Small and Mining drones from your cargo bay to another ship's drone bay.


Skills

Drone Maintenance
Requires: Drones II, Mechanic II
Proficiency in operating drone maintenance and logistics systems. Required to deploy Drone Storage Units and Drone Maintenance Nodes.
5% bonus to Drone Maintenance Node and Drone Arsenal repair system Tritanium usage per level
5% bonus to Drone Storage Unit and Drone Arsenal shield repair speed per level

Field Supply Unit Operation
Requires: Drone Maintenance III, Astronautics Rigging II
Proficiency in operating battlefield resupply units. Required to create Drone Arsenals.
Reduces Drone Maintenance Node and Drone Arsenal activation time by 3 seconds per level

Drone Upgrades
Requires: Drone Maintenance III, Drones Rigging II
Proficiency in modifying drone systems.
2% bonus to drone upgrade bonuses per level


Deployable equipment

Drone Storage Unit I
Requires: Drone Maintenance II
Capacity: 1500m^3
A container fitted with specialized handler systems for transferring drones. Recharges drone shields at 10% per second (base)
Can only handle T1 drones.
Can be combined with a Drone Maintenance Node I to create a Drone Arsenal I (requires Field Supply Unit Operation II)

Drone Storage Unit II
Requires: Drone Maintenance IV
Capacity: 1500m^3
A container fitted with specialized handler systems for transferring advanced drones. Recharges advanced drone shields at 10% per second (base)
Can only handle T2 drones.
Can be combined with a Drone Maintenance Node II to create a Drone Arsenal II (requires Field Supply Unit Operation IV)

Drone Maintenance Node I
Requires: Drone Maintenance III
Base activation time: 30 seconds (15 seconds with Field Supply Unit Operation V)
Capacity: 5 drones
Tritanium capacity: TBD
An unmanned refit platform for drones. Can be used to swap out Drone Upgrades and repair drone armour.
Requires Tritanium to repair drone armour at a rate of [TBD] Tritanium per [TBD] HP (base).
Can only handle T1 drones.
Can be combined with a Drone Storage Unit I to create a Drone Arsenal I (requires Field Supply Unit Operation II)

Drone Maintenance Node II
Requires: Drone Maintenance V
Base activation time: 30 seconds (15 seconds with Field Supply Unit Operation V)
Capacity: 5 drones
Tritanium capacity: TBD
An unmanned refit platform for advanced drones. Can be used to swap out Drone Upgrades and repair advanced drone armour.
Requires Tritanium to repair drone armour at a rate of [TBD] Tritanium per [TBD] HP (base).
Can only handle T2 drones.
Can be combined with a Drone Storage Unit II to create a Drone Arsenal II (requires Field Supply Unit Operation IV)

Drone Arsenal I
Requires: Field Supply Unit Operation II
Components: Drone Storage Unit I, Drone Maintenance Node I
Base activation time: 30 seconds (15 seconds with Field Supply Unit Operation V)
Capacity: 25 drones
Tritanium capacity: TBD
An automated mini-structure designed for large-scale drone refitting. Can be used to swap out Drone Upgrades and repair drone armour. Recharges drone shields at 10% per second (base).
Requires Tritanium to repair drone armour at a rate of [TBD] Tritanium per [TBD] HP (base).
Can only handle T1 drones.

Drone Arsenal II
Requires: Field Supply Unit Operation IV
Components: Drone Storage Unit II, Drone Maintenance Node II
Base activation time: 30 seconds (15 seconds with Field Supply Unit Operation V)
Capacity: 25 drones
Tritanium capacity: TBD
An automated mini-structure designed for large-scale advanced drone refitting. Can be used to swap out Drone Upgrades and repair drone armour. Recharges advanced drone shields at 10% per second (base).
Requires Tritanium to repair drone armour at a rate of [TBD] Tritanium per [TBD] HP (base).
Can only handle T2 drones.

Drone Upgrades (require Drone Upgrades skill to fit to drones)

Weapon Pod Mounting Upgrade I/II
Enhances drone tracking.

Penetrative Scanner I/II
Enhances drone damage.

Signal Coherency Booster I/II
Enhances drone target painter effectiveness.

Output Amplifier Array I/II
Enhances drone ECM strength.

Advanced Resistor Packs I/II
Enhances drone energy vampire effectiveness.

Subspace Interference Antenna I/II
Enhances drone stasis webifier strength.

Nanite Transfer Capsules I/II
Enhances drone armour repair effectiveness.

Transfer Capacitor Upgrade I/II
Enhances drone shield repair effectiveness.

Additional Tractor Capacitors I/II
Enhances drone mining yield.

Next post: summary and such.

Summary
With these proposals, I aim to enable drone users to upgrade their primary weapon, and resupply it, with similar ease to how turret and missile users upgrade and resupply theirs, while maintaining lore compatibility. I also aim to make it easier for fleets to go raiding other people's space - if you can bring your replacement drones in the same ships as your spare ammo, you can stay out for longer, particularly with Gallente ships. It should also make it easier to set up temporary bases in other people's space or in wormholes.

Notes
Drone Storage Units can be loaded with drones from either cargo or a drone bay. Drones from a DSU can also be moved to either cargo or a drone bay. This is why they're different to normal jetcans; there's currently no way to restock with drones in space.

While they have an activation timer, FSUs and DAs are not secure. So if an enemy fleet (or just a passing pirate) happen across a fleet resupplying, they can quite easily swoop in and steal the drones, just as easily as stealing ammo from a jetcan.

While skills are required to deploy FSUs, DAs, and DSUs, anyone can put drones in them, or take them out. However, the same skills are required to use the armour repair functionality of FSUs and DAs.

Two Drone Upgrades can be fitted to each drone. They must be removed before the drone is sold. They can remain fitted but ineffective if they are given to a pilot who does not have the Drone Upgrades skill.

Other bit
I've been asked to mention salvage drones in this suggestion, and I will! Salvage drones are a thing that should happen. If they do, here's their Drone Upgrade:

Pattern Analysis Scanner I/II
Enhances drone salvage chances.

Other other bit
I didn't have room in the OP, so here's two more Drone Upgrades:

Shield Extension Generators I/II
Enhances drone shield strength.

Additional Power Supply I/II
Enhances drone shield recharge speed.

Deflective Armour Panels I/II
Enhances drone armour strength.

I agree that it is a limitation. However, I think that it's a reasonable one, since that's why there's limited m3 in the drone bay. If CCP wanted us to be able to field as many drones as we could fit in our cargo, and swap them out as desired, they would have made it possible to launch drones from the cargo bay.

I'm going with "already working as intended" with this one, I'm pretty sure that being able to swap drones from the cargo bay to the drone bay at will would be fairly exploitable. Besides the fact that I'm not seeing any real need for it in the game to begin with.

I tend to agree on the idea to transfer drones from cargo bay to drone bay, but this do only apply when flying alone. In fleets it is possible to have a bud to drop a few; disconnect them and you just scoop them up.

Would however be more 'fair' if they dropped a bit more often from wrecks according to the level of the mission. Light drones in L1 missions; Medium from L2 - L3; Large from L4 or something similar.

To use your own cargo, you need to actually take the time to deploy a DSU - awkward in a firefight, which is why haulers using them to resupply you after a battle is more likely (you don't pick up fresh ammo halfway through a fight, you warp out or wait until the fighting's over). Besides, other ships can carry several thousand rounds in their cargoholds, and those aren't going anywhere - unlike drone ships, which can lose half their firepower to a single smartbombing destroyer.


Seems to me that drone ships need that boost, particularly Gallente ones; they're stuck with blasters as their other weapon system, and we all know how that's going.

I'm also not sure how it could be exploited, really. Remember, there's equal opportunity to cut off the drone supply and leave you stuck in the middle of someone else's space with nothing but what you had in your bay at the time, by simply blowing up the haulers carrying the DSUs and spare drones.


I'm not proposing a direct drone space boost; DSUs need to be deployed like any other container, and Handlers can't transfer from your hold to your drone bay, only from someone else's hold to your drone bay.


The point here is that you need that Orca or capital to replenish your primary weapon system. For any other ship type, you just need a guy with a couple of cargo expanders and a jetcan.

As far as anchorable structures go, why not? The ones proposed here that actually require any kind of deployment timer (FSUs and DAs) stand at only 30 seconds, at most, to activate. As for capacity: 750m^3 (DSU) is quite a lot as far as drones go, 5 drones (FSU) is reasonable considering what it does, and 25 drones (DA)...well, I was worried about that being too much.

EDIT: What the hell has the draft function got against end-of-line periods and ]'s?

When you are solo pvping for weeks at a time in Providence, losing a set of drones is REALLY ********.

You can't simply have a covops alt bring you more drones, like you would ammo, you need to take the gila/ishtar all the way back to hisec to dock up.

It's a little absurd.

wall of text,
something about reload drone bay in space.

its basically called a carrier, Orca or anything else with a ship maint bay.

What would be interesting is if, logi's could be some how be shoe horned with a small but meaningful corp hanger and ship maint array system, that would effectively allow refitting in space.


randomly swapping out drones in an active engagement, ie swapping one set for another is intreging, but some dev some where was saying they didn't like things like titan's , sc's refitting all there fittings mid fight from say ratting / travel fit to all out tank.

Looking at the replies (thanks for those, by the way), I think I need to reiterate - I'm not suggesting the ability to resupply directly from your own cargo. I'm suggesting the ability to resupply from another ship's cargo (which requires a specialized module), or from a deployed container (again, specialized).

Perhaps some limitations would be needed, I'll admit. Maybe make Drone Handlers active modules, with a cap cost, and make DSUs take some time to complete the moving-drones-to-bay operation (I wouldn't say as long as 3 minutes though, turrets and missiles don't take that long to reload. 10 seconds is quite adequate, IMO).