Cargo Drones question

[IRWorm]

I've a Monitor supply ship with 26+ cargo drones. Five cargo crates floating just meters from its hull. Aware of the timer on cargo crates being so short that they'll explode before I reach them all, I hope the large number of drones will make up the difference and still claim most or all of them. However, after giving commands to claim each crate, a single drone pops out and snails slowly to the first crate. On the info panel it reads "Cargo Drones Active 1". I just have one question. Whyyyyyyy?

[Wraith]

instead of a cargo drone you should get a fighter with a repeat order of collect loot and dock or collect loot and put it into player HQ much faster in my opinion.

[IRWorm]

Is there a particular fighter with a large cargo hold you like? Must be a Teladi ship, I suppose.

[mmmcheesywaffles]

Inventory items do not use cargo space. So any fighter will do. Larger wares need a freighter.

[Xenomorph]

The OP is talking about ware containers, not ship drops. Fighters cant pick those up.

Cargo drones are notoriously bad, for whatever reason. If you're not using mods, i'm afraid it will be hard picking anything before it vanishes. You can still scoop containers with the tractor beam, if you're close enough (5k i think?). If you are using mods, i suggest something that improves tractor beam range and speed.

[IRWorm]

Originally posted by Xenomorph:

The OP is talking about ware containers, not ship drops. Fighters cant pick those up.

Cargo drones are notoriously bad, for whatever reason. If you're not using mods, i'm afraid it will be hard picking anything before it vanishes. You can still scoop containers with the tractor beam, if you're close enough (5k i think?). If you are using mods, i suggest something that improves tractor beam range and speed.

Oh, I forgot about the tractor beam/cargo magnet. So there's no other way to get more than one cargo drone working at once? I had thought I had seen that in action before at least 2 or 3 at a time. Yeah, mod that made them swarm out and collect would seem to be what I need. I haven't played with mods since Split Vendetta.

[AlPhi]

I believe that if you give the capital the command 'collect drops' with a target sphere then multiple drones will launch simultaneously and try to collect everything in that sphere leaving from the ship's current location. However, if you issue the command collect (specified) wares and keep clicking on the drops you wanted, then you are in effect issuing a series of single round trip orders for just one drone to conduct.

[IRWorm]

Originally posted by AlPhi:

I believe that if you give the capital the command 'collect drops' with a target sphere then multiple drones will launch simultaneously and try to collect everything in that sphere leaving from the ship's current location. However, if you issue the command collect (specified) wares and keep clicking on the drops you wanted, then you are in effect issuing a series of single round trip orders for just one drone to conduct.

That did the trick. Collect drops command had the drones swarming out as you might expect.