Drones

Drones are one of the two types of unmanned craft in COADE. They are, essentially, a gun (or coilgun, or railgun, or laser, or even carrier module) with a powerplant to feed it and some rockets to move it. The game identifies drones as a ship with remote control, no crew and at least one weapon. Drones, like missiles are used as payload for carrier modules. They cannot be launched without a carrier as you cannot select them in the fleet design menu in sandbox or campaign.

It is often convenient to categorized drones based on weapons type they use and their mass as they usually have different tactical usages.

Drones by weapon type:

* **Gun drones** - carry either a railgun, coilgun or a conventional cannon. Their main purpose is to deal damage to capital ships as their type of weapon is only mildly useful for defense against other small targets. They are very deadly to anything not protected by lasers or other types of long-range defences. In particular, drones bearing conventional cannons can be made very compact and launched by the thousands.
* **Laser drones** - carry a laser and are usually used as interceptors (see Use\_of\_Laser\_Drones). Laser drones excel against gun drones and in some circumstances can be used to damage enemy lasers and missiles.
* **Missile drones** - another type of drones designed to hit capital ships. They are also called missile busses and can be considered as a first stage for getting missiles on their target. Usually not as efficient in terms of mass, missile drones have and important niche - to overwhelm and defeat enemy lasers, including large, multi-gigawatt designs.
* **Multi-purpose** - these are usually larger drones carrying multiple weapons. They are similar in purpose and tactics to capital ships, but they still require carriers to deploy.

Drones by mass:

* **Micro drones** -Anything less than a hundred kilograms. These are used in extreme numbers and are usually low quality and only have a weapon on it so the game calls it a drone and this causes missiles and drones to target it, so you can cheaply destroy entire swarms of missiles with a thousandth the cost. these are also meant for long term engagements due to the fact that, if you have more ammo than the enemy, you can outlast them. A swarm of micro drones can wreak havoc on lightly armored capitol ships due to the sheer number of waves you can fire at them and the fact that you can target the lasers first, and even if all the drones are wiped out, you can send a few more waves until the lasers are wiped out and then fire the small drones to penetrate the Armour or take out the heavier guns to allow a sub capitol drone to finish the ship off. Lasers are only limited in killing these drones by their rotation speed, not the time it takes to kill a single drone.

these drones can be countered by firing a single small drone at them and turning off the engine, allowing these micro drones to expend their fuel trying to circle around to kill it.

* **Small drones** - From a hundred kilograms to a few dozen tonnes, these drones can be deployed in relatively large numbers. This is the only type of drone (by mass) present on stock ships. They usually have only one weapon. They can be used in anti missile roles due to their low cost and high number. Their method of destroying missiles involves actually shooting the missiles down instead of wasting the missile's Delta V. Their guns can usually penetrate a capitol ship's Armour if there is a swarm of the drones, and they tend to last longer against kinetic CIWS. (but due to the fact that lasers will still instantly take these out, it is better to use micro drones first to take out the lasers)

these drones can be countered by using Laser point defense systems or by using micro drones with swiveling guns.

* **Sub-capital drones** - drones massing from hundred to eight hundred tonnes, these drones can mount heavier armor and several weapons but are still smaller than capital ships. They are usually designed to go toe-to-toe with regular capital ships but are still lighter because they lack crew.

Because these drones usually have significant armor, they can tank lasers and Regular CIWS, so it may be viable to send a group of these to take out a capitol ship, but because of their cost, it may be a better idea to send in micro drones to take away their point defenses first.

these drones can be countered by using a swarm of smaller, more agile drones.

* **Capital drones** - starting from eight hundred tonnes or possibly and usually a kiloton or heavier, these are as large as regular capital ships but can carry more weapons instead of crew modules. They are very formidable, however they still require carriers which tend to be very large. Due to the fact that you do not need crew modules, and can use more compact remotes, you can have thicker Armour in a more compact space. for the same price as a crewed ship.

These drones usually are not set to target other drones, and cannot be countered by sending in swarms of smaller drones to run it out of DV, but you can use the same tactic that you would use against capitol ships against these because of their high cost, so fire waves of micro drones to pick off the lasers, then small ones to weaken the armor and projectile cannons, then you can send a sub capitol drone to finish it off if the others did not already.