Experimental Lab

The **Experimental Lab** is the fourth section of Chapter 3, where aliens are experimenting with drones

## Walkthrough

After you defeat the Celestipede and enter the door in the wall, at the end of the tunnel are two spots that need Power Blocks to be placed. On the walls to the left and right (with the glass and cyan sea lanterns), you can use your rocket boots to climb through and up to the top, where there is a Power Block on each side.

Once you place both Power Blocks the door opens, and you can enter the **Experimental Lab**.

Unlike most areas of the map, the Experimental Lab has no drones (***at first**)*, and not any required puzzles to make your way through. Just keep moving forward, following the paths and using Link Teleporters. The Varkem Soldiers will walk the path themselves, but you can walk at your own pace - they will teleport to catch up, and if they get too far ahead they will stop and wait.

The only real threat is the yellow room, which has some large but stationary Electric Drones which emit electricity among beams of end rods that shoot from them. Falling into a beam will kill you, so you will need to dodge around them as you fall down.

Once you reach the end of the area with the floating sea-lantern stars, a cutscene will show the door shutting behind you, separating you, Utgy, Narelle and Lucas from the rest of the Varkem Soldiers. A bunch of drones will then spawn in front of you, and you have to fight.

In this area, drones spawn in large waves. There are three main waves, which each have a distinct set of drones that spawn, however within each wave are 10 “sub-waves” that spawn one at a time. The next sub-wave spawns once only a certain amount of drones remain.

The tenth sub-wave is always the mini-boss of that wave. In Wave 1 the mini-boss is the Assembler Drone Mini, in Wave 2 it is the Drone Brain, and in Wave 3 it is the Experimental Drone D-UD3.

## Wave 1 - The Swarm Wave

### Mobs:

Experimental Drone S-W4M is the primary swarm-based drone. The size and strength of a regular drone but very weak (easy to kill) and doesn’t deal much damage. Their numbers are massive though.

Experimental Drone S-14K is the same as S-W4M in terms of stats, but they often spawn piled up on top of each other. There can be a stack of 2, 5 or 10, or one with a cluster of 5 directly on top.

### Mini Boss - Assembler Drone Mini

The Assembler Drone Mini is a smaller, sleeker form of the Assembler Drone that hovers in mid-air, moving around the outside of the arena in a circle, and will constantly spawn more drones to assist it as you fight it.

Like the original Assembler Drone it has four arms. On the Assembler Drone Mini its four arms can be damaged and destroyed separately. The centre has 80% damage resistance when all four arms are still alive. It drops by 20% for each arm destroyed. However, similar to the Celestipede it also moves much faster as each arm gets destroyed.

The arms will alternate between spawning drones and shooting phasers.

Once all arms have been destroyed the middle will summon more drones and phasers. It also gains a new attack where it fires a beam downwards that emanates a large spread of shots outwards.

## Wave 2 - The Rejects Wave

### Mobs:

Hopping Drone Heads are drone heads that jump on the floor. The smallest ones (the rough size of an actual drone’s head) deal no damage and have low health, but a lot spawn spread out through the arena.

Flying Drone Heads have similar AI to electric drones. A ton of these spawn from the ceiling at once.

Drone Arms have the same AI as Worker Drones, but are headless. Often a lot of these spawn at once too.

Flying Arms are similar to Flying Drone Heads. Faster, but less health.

Headless Combat Drones, as their name may imply, are Combat Drones without a head. They each have lots of health.

Enlarged Drone Heads are massive Hopping Drone Heads. These can be very dangerous as they can leap very far very quickly and deal a lot of contact damage. Upon defeat they will regenerate into 2-4 smaller Hopping Drone Heads, which then split once again.

### Mini Boss - Drone Brain

The Drone Brain has the following attacks:

- The real Drone Brain will face to the direct centre of the arena and fire a continuous beam for a few seconds.

- The Drone Brains will fire spreads of shots in the direction of the closest player.

- Shoots some exploding drone heads straight up that then take aim at a random player or attackable entity and fly towards them (they do not home in, they only take aim when reaching their highest point).

- A multitude of flying drone heads will spawn around the outer edges of the arena, which will fly towards the centre, cross through, and go back out to the outer edge.

Like the Assembler Drone Mini it moves around the outside of the arena in a circle, moving faster as it loses health, however it moves close to the ground. It boasts high projectile and blast protection as well as high resistance to the Beam of Light, Extreme Beam, Electric Burst and Orange Phaser Turret Staff. Melee weapons will deal the most damage to this boss.

When it reaches 75% health it summons a “fake” drone brain that moves in a different direction to it. The real one may continue moving in the same direction in the circle or in the opposite direction while the fake one goes in the other direction.

At 50% health two more “fake” drone brains are summoned from the real and the fake one, totalling three fake drone brains in total.

## Wave 3 - The Innovation Wave

### Mobs:

Experimental Drone H-U76 is a large, hulking drone that moves slowly by default, but irregularly gains bursts of random high speed (can gain speeds of levels 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, 18 or 20 which lasts for 3 seconds. The cooldown until its next speed boost then gets set to 6-10 seconds). They are very tough to kill, as they have a lot of health and knockback resistance, as well as high projectile protection. They don’t do much damage, but do have very strong knockback so it could potentially knock you into danger.

Experimental Drone L-453 is a drone that emits a red laser in front of it kind of like an Extreme Beam. It has a range of 4 blocks, and fires once every 3.5-5.5 seconds. It moves slowly but has a lot of knockback resistance, and a moderate amount of health.

Experimental Drone R-0C4 is a drone that shoots purple shots that explode upon hitting a wall, player or ally, making them very dangerous. They don’t have a lot of health so they are kind of glass cannons, and can be taken out easily from a distance.

Experimental Drone C-470 is a speedy drone that leaves cryo flames on the floor as it moves. It (and all the other drones in this wave) have cryo resistance. It moves pretty fast and has a moderate amount of health.

### Mini Boss - Experimental Drone D-UD3

Experimental Drone D-UD3, the mini-boss of Wave 3, spawns in the middle of the room and is immobile, but very tough and strong. It is immune to Orbs, Electric Drones and Orange Phaser Turrets summoned by the player, and allies that try to approach it will get teleported backwards.

It has the following attacks:

* Emanates four multicoloured lasers that spin around it. The lasers extend all the way out to the edges of the arena, but can be jumped over to avoid taking damage.
* Summons evoker-fangs that spawn in spirals around it, snapping up to deal damage.
* Starts spinning around and firing music shots, which move forward and deal damage in a large area. Upon hitting a block a music shot will bounce, turning directly backwards.
* (Only below 60% health) Spawns four Experimental Drones next to it. It spawns C-470 and H-U76 if a player is close to it, and L-453 and R-0C4 if no players are close to it.

Also when below 60% health D-UD3 can choose up to two attacks to use at the same time.

When below 25% health it will exclusively use an attack where it will face away from you and emanate a large laser. It will then spin slowly, doing a full 360 and sweeping the laser the entire way.

## Equipment

Sonic Blast Arm - 25 Attack Damage, 0.8 Attack Speed. Knockback II. Has a 2% chance of dropping from Experimental Drone H-U76.

Laser Drone Head - When right-clicking while holding, it emits a red laser that deals 8-12 damage to all enemies hit. Has 4 range and a cooldown of 1 second. Has a 2% chance of dropping from Experimental Drone L-453.

Drone Fusion Launcher - Up to 20 Explosive Damage. Has a fire rate of 1 second. Has a 2% chance of dropping from Experimental Drone R-0C4.

Frostflame Arm - 12 Attack Damage, No attack cooldown, Fire Aspect II. Has a 2% chance of dropping from Experimental Drone C-470.

## Recommendations

In Waves 1 and 2, the Extreme Beam is your best friend, as it can tear through absolutely everything with ease. Using the Shockwave Gauntlet’s slam and setting up an Antimatter Orb will also be of great assistance. Explosive weapons, however, are likely to result in you blowing yourself up due to the massive amount of mobs that attack at close-quarters.

If the Celestipede dropped the Electric Burst, that can also be very useful.

In Wave 3, each type of drone has an extremely different attack pattern and certain weapons will work better on some than on others.

Having an Antimatter Orb set up in the centre of the arena can be useful throughout this whole section. If the Celestipede dropped the Orange Phaser Turret Staff, same dealio.

Mobs in this section also drop a considerable amount of Combat Drone Parts, which can fill up your inventory. There are two Matter Manipulators in the arena which you can use to craft them into Varkem Metal.

As for the mini-bosses, the Assembler Drone Mini can be taken down quickly with explosive weapons, since they can damage all the arms at once. They won’t deal a huge amount of damage to the centre however, until the arms are destroyed. Once they are, switch to a Plasma Rapid Blaster and begin firing.

Melee weapons are the best for the Drone Brain. A heavy weapon such as the Broken Cannon or Celestipede on a Stick is extremely viable since due to its high speed and variety of attacks you may not get many opportunities to hit it up close.

Ranged weapons such as the Plasma Rapid Blaster can deal a tiny bit of damage, but it will take a long time to take down in exclusively this manner. Also, remember the real Drone Brain flashes red upon taking damage, while the fake ones don’t, so even a ranged weapon can be useful for discerning which one is real.

Most of Experimental Drone D-UD3’s attacks are long-range. Learn the attacks to avoid taking damage, and keep your distance and fire at it with the ranged weapon of your choice. When it starts using its final laser attack below 25% health, you can probably safely get up to it from behind and hit it with a melee weapon.