Quick drones vs Long Lasting Drones

[Kanrie]

Which is better? Quick drones/Instant Drones OR Long Lasting Drones/Drone Horde?

Quick Drones upgrade into Instant Drones with these stats:

Battle Drones upgrade from 8 to 12
Shots per Drone 10 (doesn't change)
Drone Spawn time 3s upgrades to 1s

So with Instant Drones you get 12 drones in 12 seconds each shooting 120 shots

Meanwhile Long Lasting Drones upgrades into Drone Horde

Battle Drones upgrade from 10 to 18

(that's 6 more drones than Instant drones, albeit it takes 90 second for all 18 drones to spawn if am understanding this correctly)

Shot per Drone 16 upgrades to 32

(that's 22 more shots per drone, around 10 seconds in a wave you'd have 2 drones shooting 44 shot meanwhile Instant drones would have 10 shooting 100 shots)

Drone Spawn time 5s

[Draco18s]

Not listed:
How frequently a drone will fire a shot.

I've more or less given up on long-lasting drones because they'll sit there and ignore the last enemy alive (typically the worm that hurls a black glob) and constantly shoot down its projectile, but never shoot it.

Fast drones don't have this problem. They come out fast, they hit the bulk of the wave hard, and then taper off slowly as the wave winds down (so even their flaw isn't actually a problem: few of them left? well there's only a few enemies left too!).

[rollin340]

Instant Drones gets you 12 Drones in 12 seconds that fire 10 shots each. Drone Horde gets you 18 Drones in 90 seconds that fire 32 shows each.

The real question is how often do you even have fights that last 90 seconds? It's why I now use Quick Drones to Instant Drones instead. I actually get the full potential damage output from it. 5 Seconds per Drone is just way too slow.

[Draco18s]

Originally posted by rollin340:

The real question is how often do you even have fights that last 90 seconds?

Yeah.
Or even if they do, how many things are still alive?

[zimny5811]

Here is a simple solution, short to medium length run - Quick Drones, really long runs (mostly Endless Mode on Prestige or trying to survive as long as possible on Relic Hunt) - Long Lasting Drones.

[Kanrie]

I did the Defective weapon challenge with Instant Drones and the only enemies they couldn't get were those who'd take cover when shot at and won't become vulnerable again for 10 seconds or so, like the big bird that hovers at the center of the screen or the monster spawner mob that spawns hordes of little monsters consistently

[rollin340]

I think the flying one is the only monster that actually goes invulnerable. Pretty sure the spawner just gets a huge armor bonus when it isn't trying to birth the little twerps.

But other than those, the other annoying one is the flying spawner. They don't do anything unless they get attacked, and the Drones keep doing just that. It's very annoying. lol

[Draco18s]

Originally posted by rollin340:

I think the flying one is the only monster that actually goes invulnerable. Pretty sure the spawner just gets a huge armor bonus when it isn't trying to birth the little twerps.

There are two ground enemies that duck underground to go invulnerable as well. The one that throws a gob at you and then the little guys that aren't the microscopic guys.

[rollin340]

I HATE THAT WORM THING! It pops out, wobble a bit, then shoots its turn at me, then goes back into hiding. It's so annoying to deal with! I hate the kamikazee buggers too, but the coward is worse.

[Draco18s]

Yea. They're one of the reasons why "drones" is my go-to secondary. Its got both utility (yes, shuttle those resources, thanks) and defense (mm, combat drones~).

Quick drones are really good about dealing with the glob and I can focus-down the worm itself. The only downside is that I have to focus fire on the little ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ kamikazee buggers so the drones don't waste shots on them, but it's not a huge deal.