How to use Drones

[Cuddlefish]

How do I get Racter's drone to do anything? I can make it go thorugh a vent, but not attack anyone. Sorry if this is a dumb question but I just can't see how to do this.

[benjamincarylewis]

You need to put it into "Control Mode" (but you also need to do this to send it through a vent, so not sure what you're missing?)

Once it's in Control Mode, you can select it and use melee/guns as with any other character.

[Watchman]

...you know, like every drone since the original SRR. :|

[benjamincarylewis]

Sure, if you happen to have played through SR:DMS or SR:DF, AND you happen to have used a drone in one of those two games (it's really easy not to), then it's just the same. :p

[Watchman]

*cough*Blitz*cough*
...or, idk, read the "Rigger" entry in the ingame manual/help/wutevar. ¯\(ツ)/¯

[Cuddlefish]

I have read the directions. Had no trouble access the drone tray to get the drone to go through an air vent. But the drone tray doesn't look available to me in combat. I have played the other two games and couldn't figure out how to access Blitz's drone then either. Ah sorry, I just realized that the access to the drone tray is over to the right using a joystick and not on the combat menu. when making the drone go through the vent, it was in the combat area

[benjamincarylewis]

Sure, if you've (optionally) played DF you may have (optionally) used Blitz's drone, but I think we can assume the OP did not. And last I checked, the in-game help is far from complete (I don't recall if it explains hold/follow/control for drones). I'm not sure what purpose is served by sarcastic comments to people who have not yet figured it out for themselves.

To the OP: yeah, you want to start with the joystick icon to the right (or 'T' hotkey if I recall). I thought this was the same as when activating for vents, but maybe there's more than one method.

[Watchman]

Figuring out the Hold/Follow commands takes roughly five seconds of experimentation, out of combat. Just sayin'.

...btw correct me if I'm wrong since I didn't really pay attention the last time I sent Koschei vent-crawling, but isn't the procedure to activate and select a drone for that *exactly* the same as for turning on control mode in combat?

[benjamincarylewis]

Wait, you can put an NPC's drone into "hold" mode outside of combat? That's news to me.

[Watchman]

*shrug* I did that all the time with Blitz's to keep it parked somewhere safe when he needed to deck stuff in combat. It was annoying to have it just sitting there while getting shot to pieces.

Also occasionally useful for prepositioning it in a vent for a future flanking maneuver.

[Chigen Atomic]

I have realized that I am far more abusive towards my drones than I realized. I tend to let them follow me so there's more targets on the field so I avoid getting shot.

[Watchman]

...you monster.

[benjamincarylewis]

Ha, I did one run with a drug mule, and did that once I emptied it out. It was pretty funny watching the enemies all target the empty mule, totally ignoring all my NPCs who were shooting at them.

Yeah, it still has the hyper injector and the zapper, but it was more useful as a bullet magnet.

[Chigen Atomic]

Originally posted by benjamincarylewis:

Ha, I did one run with a drug mule, and did that once I emptied it out. It was pretty funny watching the enemies all target the empty mule, totally ignoring all my NPCs who were shooting at them.

And what's worse is that it was empty. Not like there's any tactical advantage to destroying it.

[benjamincarylewis]

Yes, quite; though I guess you could argue that the enemies don't know that, at least for the first turn. And SR enemies clearly do not learn from their mistakes, as amply demonstrated by Duncan's Shiawase magnet arm :)

[Chigen Atomic]

For the most part you don't fight the same force more than once, but admittedly it could get around. 'There's this big ork guy. Don't throw grenades at him, or he'll catch 'em and throw 'em back. Got one of those magnet arms.'