The Drained

[gmsh1964]

I do not understand what 'The Drained' or the enemy drained units.., etc.., And the weapon modifiers that state they Drain enemy units.., Is that similar to enslaved or something like that? I sort of understand the Essence part as that is a buff. I played about 40 some turns with the Syndicate/Heritor combo, and I do not believe I ever saw a drained unit, or however that works? Thank you.

[MattStriker]

Drained are a unit that can't be recruited, you can only get them by using a special heritor tactical op on an enemy infantry unit and then killing that unit. They're pretty weak but easy to mass while on the march, they gain levels very quickly and once they hit max level you can effectively trade them in for a better unit by possessing an enemy.

[gmsh1964]

Matt, thank you. I went into a saved game and now I understand. After the battle, I now understand. Are all Drained units look like that (three ghosts in armor)? Do you think they are really worth spending a Tac Op on? I will set up another game and see how that turn out for me.

[sandman25dcsss]

Note there is a mod which allows to possess tier 3 unit. Before that I believe 80 energy is too expensive for tier 1-2 unit, but it is useful for reinforcing stacks, also the possessed unit keeps all equipped mods which can be nice too.

[gmsh1964]

Keeps the mods.., hmm, I need to pay attention to the Drained stuff a little more. You also mention a mod for Tier 3.., are you saying that you can only get Drained units for Level 1 and 2? Wow, is this written anywhere, thanks,

Thanks.

[sandman25dcsss]

Yes, it is written in tech tree and in-game help. You can hover mouse over XP of the drained to see what it gets at elite, then find the ability in help to see what it does. Part about keeping mods is not written as far as I remember. I learned it from experience.
By the way Drained is a rare unit that becomes stronger with xp, its damage is increased by 2 at every level.

[K'senia]

Well there are a number of different things that are 'drained'. There is s a T1 Heritor unit. These are made by using the 'drained' tactical operation on an enemy. They spawn when the unit dies. Energy drain is both a buff and debuff. It gives a morale penalty to enemy unit and gives a essence shard to the caster.

[snuggleform]

"The Drained" unit comes from using the tactical operation Condemn which is very early in the research tree; it must target a non-mindless infantry unit. It applies a debuff and when that infantry is killed they come back on your side as The Drained (zombie-like).

Mods that drain enemy units: they apply a debuff called energy drain I think; it's a stacking debuff that reduces damgae output by 10%. Itself isn't particularly impressive but remember as your unit gains essence you get +10% per level so overall between the buff and debuff the inheristor weapons are very powerful. The main weakness is that it takes them time to charge it up.

[Keaton]

No shortage of drained once you employ the final doomsday. Makes it easier to defend your cities, especially with the new orbital sectors.

[gmsh1964]

very helpful. Thank you very much

[Warlord]

You can get them through using a tactical ability and killing the unit. After on the strategic map you'll get the unit.

[Brucato]

But I think the drained are cool and when you get the Doctrine "Divine Legion" the Drained gain Resurgence so they will be round forever (long as you win the tac battle lol)

[Orclover]

Originally posted by Keaton:

No shortage of drained once you employ the final doomsday. Makes it easier to defend your cities, especially with the new orbital sectors.

Holy cow you end up with a lot of these guys, which is sad because you are 10 turns away from victory anyways but you suddenly have stacks upon stacks of drained showing up at all your cities.

Originally posted by gmsh1964:

very helpful. Thank you very much

Honestly drained are the best of the "free units". By themselves they have a weak attack and not much durability, so keeping them alive is a bit of a challenge and you end up using them to rush forward and finish off wounded enemies to level them up. When they hit max level you can use them to posses a Tier I or II unit and get them (and their mods). Doesnt sound great. Then you can use a mod to make it Tier III unit you capture. Well some of those Tier III units out there are pretty awesome, with some awesome mods, and thats whats so great about Drained. Grabbing a kitted out Rocket Tank or a T3 elightened/entropy unit is pretty hilarious. I usually end up with a whole squad of irregulars that I decided to grab with my drained platoons i'm leveling up.

Honestly the only "free" units that came close to them was my current game where I used the amazon's "alpha predator" strategic op once and ended up with multiple stacks of animals spawning over several turns (and still spawning last I checked). Just army upon army of critters showing up, got them doing exploration as whole army now since I don't know what else to do with them. I obviously did NOT understand that strategic ops description when I used it.