Tempus

Can someone who has experience with these please explain the different effectiveness of the two SL drones, the recon and the gunner one?

Exactly how do these work? Once they're deployed, they work automatically? How do they make use of and/or update the netbat system?

Thanks!

__________________
Battlefield 2/2142 Game Officer
Contact me with server/player/admin issues.




-- Suits are what you wear when doing things you shouldn’t want to do anyway.

FROM THE TACTICAL GAMER PRIMER.
3) Support game play in a near-simulation environment. Where the focus of play would not be solely on doing what it takes to win, but doing so utilizing real-world combat strategy and tactics rather than leveraging exploits provided to players by the design of the game engine.

=Sarc=

It's all automatic and they're affected by EMP's. I haven't tried the gun drone but the recon drone is pretty useful. It's like the support's pulse scanner. Every couple of seconds, it does a sweep and you'll see, through NetBat (red diamonds), any enemy units. I've noticed that they show up on mini-map as well. I like it on the enemy titan. If you can stay alive, you get good intel and your squad members don't waste time podding in on the beacon since there's no magic spawn inside the titan anymore.

I've heard comments about the gun drone being useless. It tends to fire back after you're dead.

__________________
JO Guides & Tutorials
Team Element - It's who you game with.

Tempus

Does the gun drone also provide scanning?

__________________
Battlefield 2/2142 Game Officer
Contact me with server/player/admin issues.




-- Suits are what you wear when doing things you shouldn’t want to do anyway.

FROM THE TACTICAL GAMER PRIMER.
3) Support game play in a near-simulation environment. Where the focus of play would not be solely on doing what it takes to win, but doing so utilizing real-world combat strategy and tactics rather than leveraging exploits provided to players by the design of the game engine.

BHack

after many hours of squad leading, I am using the bacon 98% of the time.

That being said, the recon drone is useful on defense at times. It scans the area at some set time interval and netbat ID's any hostiles around you within a certain meter radius.

The gun drone only shoots at enemies within a similar (pretty short) radius, does low damage, and will only shoot at targets that have been netbatted by a squad member. Overall, it's pretty useless, or at least useless compared to the other two.

__________________

Thanatos

The gun drone doesn't provide any sort of intel. It actually depends on the NetBat information from everyone else to do its targetting. This is why it's been called unreliable - it can only shoot what people see and even then, it can only shoot one target at a time, within range. Much better to use the Otus (recon drone) and shoot the bad guys yourselves.

I've been using the Recon drone lately and I find it's useful both in offensive and defensive situations. The great thing about it is that the drone can see behind cover, and it also automatically tracks those targets, unlike the Support pulse scanner which only takes a 'snapshot' per scan. I'm happy with it and the SLSB, but I'm not going to use an unlock on the gun drone. I'll get it with Field Upgrades if I feel like experimenting.

__________________

=Sarc=

I haven't had time to play more with the recon drone but I always thought it was like the pulse scanner. It didn't seem to track targets real-time and felt like an automated pulse scanner floating above my head. I like it and want to try out the support pulse scanner/recon drone combo for extra scanning capability.

__________________
JO Guides & Tutorials
Team Element - It's who you game with.

Zoopy_T

When I was in a squad and the squad leader had a recon drone I noticed that all the diamonds were static, like the pulse meter. I don't recal if they were on the minimap or not. The purpose is to give you an idea of home many guys there are and the approximent locations. Plus you can do a trick to jump on top of it and the drone will continue to rise with you on it.

Elite_Master

Haha, that is funny - never knew you could jump on it.. another funny thing with the drone is if you jump in a vehicle, switch views and you will see it hitting the vehicle to try to stay close to you and it will follow the vehicle at high speed (kind of funny).. ya the spawn beacon is far more useful for leading a squad than any of the drones - the attack drone sux really bad its like having a hovering sentry that is extra weak and dumb.. besides if you are on a map with a decent CO, he/she will give more than enough scans so you can see where the enemy is.

chaf3d

Whoa big guy.. the only way it tracks is due to the scan every 3-4 seconds. Otherwise its not like looking at your enemy.

I too haven't found the Gunner droid very useful. What i've been doing is Beaconing a opint, then spawning on it while i have the Recon drone. best of both worlds. Once the beacon is taken out, back to beacon to lay another and so on.

__________________
All the forces of Evil need to Succeed is for enough Good men to do nothing.
-Edmund Burke

johnflenaly

Having used the recon drone heavly sarc is correct. It does take pictures like the pds. The diamonds are static. As a intresting bit go stand next to a squad leader with one youll here a sounds like a camera going off.

chaf3d

even as SL, hear the same thing.

__________________
All the forces of Evil need to Succeed is for enough Good men to do nothing.
-Edmund Burke

Thanatos

Thanks for the corrections guys - when I saw moving diamonds, those must have been the NetBat signals from my squad mates.

__________________

LuckyStrike

If a squad leader deploys a beacon and dies he can respawn with the recon drone (or the useless gun drone). The recon drone and beacon will be in use at the same time. The bad part is that the SL cannot pick up the beacon and deploy it again while the drone is in use.

jepzilla

Just chiming in here that the gun drone is useless. Go into BFHQ, and then go to leaderboard, and look at the ranking by weapon. Pick the Accipitor and look at the best player in the game with that drone. He has about 250 kills with it. In two months. The best anybody's been able to do with it. Compare this with the sentry gun for laughs.

Useless.

chaf3d

I think i mentioned this elsewhere, but i prefere my squad spawning on me. I'll easily give up the beacon. You just have to be careful,. and remember that they can't spwn on you if there isn't about 4-5 whatevers of free space. Lots of time on Titan, i'll be trying to spawn on SL, but hes in the enemy vents, and there is no room.

__________________
All the forces of Evil need to Succeed is for enough Good men to do nothing.
-Edmund Burke