Romulan drone ship The Romulan drone ship was an advanced experimental attack starship described as a marauder and developed by the Romulan s in the 2150s . At least two prototype s of the vessel were built . The starship itself was a modified , with its propulsion systems and command circuitry largely identical to the typical Romulan warship of that era . The bridge consoles were still present when and Malcolm Reed were able to gain access to the bridge . It was quite small in comparison to . The vessel was designed to be remotely controlled from Romulus by an Aenar pilot via telepathy as chief among its many modifications . The drone ship was controlled from an operations tower in the Romulan capital by the Aenar pilot , who was forced to pilot the warship against his will . Two Romulan officer s oversaw its operation , as it was of special interest to the Romulan Senate . The ship ' s bridge was dominated by a large subspace transceiver to receive its remote orders from Romulus . The interior was confining and cramped , with bulkhead s exposing data cables at various points throughout the ship . Because of its lack of crew , much of the ship was devoid of a life support system . In addition , the drone ship featured an auto - repair system that allowed it to correct damage sustained during combat . The vessel was a formidable adversary in combat . Its weapon s were very powerful for its time , inflicting major damage on its targets . Its ability to self - repair proved an asset during battle , where damage could begin to be corrected almost immediately . Without the need for inertial dampener s to protect a crew , the drone was much more maneuverable than the average manned vessel , capable of dodging photonic torpedo es with deft barrel roll s . In 2154 , the Romulan drone ship was given the task of destabilizing potential political alliances between Earth , the Andorian s , and the Tellarite s . It was equipped with an advanced multispectral emitter system which , when activated , allowed the ship to assume the appearance of nearly any other vessel . The drone ship ' s disruptor s used tri - phasic emitter s , which could mimic the weapon signature of a wide range of other ships , from Andorian particle cannon s and Tellarite disruptor s to Starfleet phase cannon s . Using these unique abilities , the drone ship threatened to provoke a war between the Andorians and Tellarites , first by destroying Andorian commander Shran ' s warship " Kumari " in the guise of a Tellarite vessel , then by attacking the vessel carrying the Tellarite ambassador , this time posing as an Andorian warship . The Romulans later threatened to draw the Human s , and potentially their allies the Vulcan s , into the conflict , when the drone destroyed a Rigellian scoutship while mimicking the appearance of the starship " Enterprise " . Ultimately , the drone ship ' s presence may have caused what the Romulans had hoped to avoid : an against them . The appearance of a common enemy united the Andorians , Tellarites , Humans , and Vulcans , who attacked the drone and eventually forced it to withdraw to Romulan space . The Romulans subsequently launched a second drone ship , which was used in combination with the first to attack " Enterprise " . Both drone ships were destroyed when Jhamel , an Aenar , used " Enterprise " s telepresence unit to interfere , asking the pilot – her brother , Gareb – to stop his attack . Realizing his sister was on board the ship he was attacking , Gareb was strong enough to overcome the Romulans ' control , and had the two drone ships attack each other , destroying one and enabling the " Enterprise " to destroy the other , thwarting the Romulans ' attempt to destabilize the region . Background information . Conception . Writer / Producer Mike Sussman conceived the Romulan drone ship as a modified which could somehow camouflage itself but didn ' t have the ability to disguise itself as other craft . ( " " issue 39 , pp . 13 & 17 ) However , the producers wanted something slightly different than a customized Bird - of - Prey . ( " " issue 39 , p . 13 ) The drone ships ' ability to emulate other vessels was devised by Mike Sussman . He later recalled , " " While I was working on the episode I was trying to come up something else about the ship – was it just super powerful ? " " Believing Romulan vessels shouldn ' t have cloaking device s as early as the 2150s , Sussman wanted the drone ships to use a different form of camouflage . He therefore contemplated other technologies that the species might have developed . " " I started thinking about holotechnology and shapeshifting , " " Sussman continued . " " That seemed related to cloaking technology so I thought it was fair game and we hadn ' t quite seen that on " Star Trek " before . I pitched that to the producers but they were very lukewarm on it and told me to come up with something else . Without that element , it was very straightforward – it ' s a bad guy spaceship and it ' s causing trouble . The whole thing that the holographic element gave me was that there was a war brewing between the Andorians and the Tellarites [ . . . ] How would you do that if it wasn ' t one ship ? Did the Romulans steal a ship ? Were there different ships ? It just solved so many problems if you could buy into this technology . " " Despite the producers being hesitant about the drone ships ' holographic shape - changing ability , Sussman wrote it into a story outline for " Babel One " and , once the producers read it , they finally approved the technology . " " I remember Manny [ Coto ] said , ' You know what ? It works . ' It gave the story more layers , " " commented Sussman . " " If you think of it as a murder mystery , the ship was able to frame other races for its crimes . It kind of made sense because the Romulans were very duplicitous . " " ( " " issue 39 , p . 17 ) In the final draft script of " Babel One " , the Romulan drone ship was described as " " a sleek , compact but powerful - looking alien vessel [ . . . ] Although the design is unfamiliar , we ' ll eventually learn this is a prototype Romulan ship . " " Also , the ship ' s subspace transceivers were scripted to be " numerous spiky projections jutting out of the marauder ' s hull , like so many raised quills on a porcupine . " The same script declared , too , that the craft ' s bridge was to be " a redress of the Romulan Command Center " from where the vessel was controlled . In the original script of " United " , the prototype drone ship was called the " Raptor " by Admiral Valdore on at least one occasion , though this reference was omitted from the final draft of the script . In that teleplay , the drone ship , while evading weapons fire from " Enterprise " , was likened to " a ninja evading bullet s . " Model . The Romulan drone ship was a reuse of the chaotic space hulk from . This was at the behest of the ENT producers , who selected the design from an Eden FX catalogue of all the obscure models available to them for potential reuse . The producers thought the reuse of the chaotic space hulk could be justified because its previous appearance had only been a fleeting glimpse of it and had been more than six years prior , though the primary motive for recycling the design was to save money . Robert Bonchune , from Eden FX , agreed with the reuse , not only owing to the quickness of its previous appearance but also because it looked extremely different from the ships depicted before , which was important because the visual uniqueness of the ship matched how it had been described in the " Babel One " script . ( " " issue 39 , pp . 13 & 14 ) The ENT art department created a drawing of the vessel ' s exterior in a primarily green Romulan color scheme and with the ship ' s surface covered in holographic emitters . After this was approved , the image was passed on to Robert Bonchune . According to him , the craft was then given a memorable nickname . " " I got a sketch of that ship as a Romulan ship , " " Bonchune reflected . " " John Eaves [ I think ] wrote ' FLEA ' on it and that ' s what it became known as . But officially it was the Romulan drone and that is it . " " ( " " issue 39 , pp . 13 - 14 ) After receiving the illustration , Rob Bonchune began modifying the relevant computer - generated model at Eden FX . " " I could have had our modelers Pierre [ Drolet ] or Koji [ Kuramura ] do it , " " noted Bonchune , " " but that would have just added to what was on their plates . " " Since Bonchune himself was already working on the ship ' s modifications , he opted to continue doing so . ( " " issue 39 , p . 14 ) Because importance was still placed on budget - saving , Rob Bonchune didn ' t spend too much time altering the ship ' s CG model . " " I was changing colors , adding antennas , and rebooting the lights , without rebuilding it [ . . . ] All those things were in place . It was really just changing colors , " " he explained . " " I illuminated some antennas I didn ' t like and changed the internal lighting . " " The biggest differences in the CG model took place because , in the six years since it had originally been built , processing power had greatly increased . This allowed Bonchune to make the holographic generators on the hull as elaborate as he wanted . Thus , the model took advantage of the relatively new ability to turn on ray - tracing lights , which had been impossible to do for episodes of due to insufficient render power . " " So I upgraded the lighting , " " stated Bonchune . " " I put some interactive light in for the holoprojectors and we could have them glowing , and I made some changes to the point lights at the end of the bigger antennas . It didn ' t take long . We gave them exactly what they wanted – a ship that cost virtually nothing . " " ( " " issue 39 , p . 14 ) The intention to make the drone ship seem at first as if it isn ' t Romulan influenced the animation of the vehicle . " " We made it move in a very different way , " " Rob Bonchune observed . " " It could do these weird flips and turns . " " Bonchune felt these erratic movements were identical to how a UFO maneuvers . ( " " issue 39 , p . 14 ) Legacy . As evidenced by the first draft script of the ultimately undeveloped film " " , " hundreds " of Romulan drone ships were to have appeared in that movie . Their design was described as " a hideous vessel ( it looks like a colossal flea ) " . The drone ships were to have followed close behind the Romulan flagship ( which would have been a Romulan Bird - of - Prey ) in an assault against Earth , initially hiding behind Earth ' s moon , Luna . Apocrypha . In the 25th century timeline of " Star Trek Online " , Drone Ships are used by both the Romulan Star Empire and the breakaway Romulan Republic . In the Republic , drone ships are deployable by the " Scimitar " line of Dreadnought Warbird s . Like the original versions , drone ships are able to use their multispectral and tri - phasic emitters to mimic the appearance and weapon properties of various opposing ships , including frigates , Borg probe s , Klingon Birds - of - Prey , and others . Unlike the originals , though , the drone ships are controlled remotely by the crew of the ship and do not need an Aenar pilot to function .