Not another Drone thread...

With the addition of the Drones Returned stat as well as the Dronenet View layer, I would like to revisit the idea of an offensive drone gameplay that we all have tried dipping our spoon into however I will incorporate the Kinetic Capsule and the Mark I drone. I will use the term Offense Drone to refer to this drone.


Here's a quick summary:

Hacking using the Mark I drone will give the chance of the Mark I hacking one of three Offense Drone parts. Once the Offense Drone parts have been hacked, they can be placed inside the Kinetic Capsule with an Offense Drone recipe. The agent must then walk the distance to create an Offense Drone. The Offense Drone can be deployed to destroy 3 enemy drones before another has to be created. Agents can hold up to 5 Offense Drones at a time.


Deeper synopsis

Hacking the Offensive Drone Parts: Any level portal can yield any of the three Offensive Drone parts, however, certain portal levels have a higher ratio of each part.

(IE: L1-L3 portals have a higher yield of Offensive Drone Wings part while L4-L6 portals have a higher yield of Offensive Drone Fuselage and L7-L8 portals yield Offensive Drone XM Core.)

Again, all portal levels can yield any of the three parts, however, certain portal levels have a higher yield of specific parts. This will hopefully incentivize agents to move drones to other level portals instead of holding in L8 farms.

The Kinetic Capsule recipe can be as Niantic wants it to be made, however, I think either a Turret or Force Amp should be part of the recipe.


What are everyone's thoughts and how do you think this can be improved? I tried keeping it fairly simple, yet balanced in gameplay.

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Comments

  • ZeroHecksGivenZeroHecksGiven ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited May 2021

    What’s the point of an offense drone if we can do it now without all that work?

    Brian made mention, again, that he strongly believes that playing this game, at the portals, is the main objective above everything else.

  • ToxoplasmollyToxoplasmolly ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited May 2021

    At first blush, I'm not convinced that the Kinetic Capsule requirement is enough to offset the fact that this idea is, otherwise, playing while sitting on your proverbial couch. The way things are currently, to return someone's drone back to them, you have to actually visit the portal it's on, which can play into any number of things that Ingress generally tries to encourage (adventures on foot, exercise, exploration, etc.).

    Maybe it all ends up being about the same, in the end, depending on how much you have to walk to forge this new drone.

  • HydracyanHydracyan ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited May 2021

    Im gonna make It even simpler: instead of hacking, the agent could choose to attack (a drone in the same portal). An attack would not be enough to destroy the other drone, but will have fewer delay, like half an hour, giving a chance to the opponent flee (by moving to other portal or recalling). Recalling a damaged drone should also increase the forced recall status (aka the only bad status on our profiles, that show our loses).

  • RobertoXVIIRobertoXVII ✭✭✭

    Good question. Having up to 5 Offensive Drones, you can place them in different places. You went to the farm at the park yesterday to take down the other faction's drone and they sent it back up today? You don't have to go back immediately. You can use one of the Offensive Drones you left there to take it down twice more before you have to revisit.

  • RobertoXVIIRobertoXVII ✭✭✭

    I thought about this as well, which is why I believe the Offensive Drone should have a limit of 3 enemy Drone Returns before you have to make a new one. This way after that third drone you destroy, you have to walk a new one.

  • GrogyanGrogyan ✭✭✭✭✭

    What you are essentially proposing is, boosts to be craftable.


    While damaging drones with other drones sounds neat, it doesn't quite fit in with the Ingress design.


    However crafting a boost to enable an item to be ferried by a drone. That has opportunities for getting out to stop said drone

    A craftable boost to enable drones to travel alone links. Also has opportunities for getting out of the arm chair

    By neutralizing portals they are on, or attempting to travel along their links

  • RobertoXVIIRobertoXVII ✭✭✭

    This isn't a bad idea, however, I don't believe it adds a deeper level of gameplay. The incorporation of the Kinetic Capsule, the small RNG ratio of hacking drone parts, and the establishing of offensive drones in your play area seems like it can create a more diverse game style.

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