Division Details

Rogue Drones
Ticker	RD
Leads	Authochthonian, Chevalleis, Myxx
Archivists	Authochthonian, Chevalleis
Status	Active
Channel	AJ: RD
Staff
Research	Chevalleis, Myxx, Yuni/Unit Commune, Authochthonian
Contributors	Hilen Tukoss, Authochthonian

Overview

The Sentient Splinter Alvi is a short range Third Generation Rogue Drone (Frigate Class), it appears to have been built for patrol duties and is optimized for close range combat and Elint duties. With its weapons only being effective at under 6 Kilometers in range and be outfitted with many manipulator arms which could do serious damage to any ship it gets its claws into. As is common with Rogue Drones it has a high velocity which is in keeping with its apparent purpose of Hive defence, in that it must close rapidly to get to grips with any thing that might threaten the Hive and any of the worker drones present.

Other then offence this drone operates in a Command & Control capacity for patrols that operate away from the immediate viconity of the Hive, it may also operate as an Overseer during construction work for the Hive, watching over and coordinating all the other various Rogue Drones involved in the work.

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Analysis

Design

The first thing that should be noted about this Rogue Drone's design is it is obviously of Rogue Drone origin as it bears no resemblance to any current ship designed or manufactured by any of the Empires or Capasuleer's. This Rogue Drone is designed with a central "C" shaped hull which has multiple manipulator arms, four large arms are mounted on the central hull just behind the neck, 2 medium sized manipulators are mounted on the bottom of the head and at the end of the tail is a large grasping claw which has very high strength. There is an external spine running parallel to the main hull which terminates above the head in a weapon pod, just before this weapon pod the spine has a cone structure that come out of the main hull and passes straight through the spine before it comes to a point. Either side of this spine (directly opposite the head in alignment) is a series of 6 cones, 3 on either side, and on the top of the neck just before the head is another series of 3 cones in a straight line. The overall design of this Rogue Drone is reminiscent of the common species of Prawn, whether this is by coincidence or design we do not know.

Systems

The directional based sensor suite including Ladar, Magnetometric & Visual capability with a scan resolution of 950mm (which is comparable to Empire Frigates) are housed inside the head of the Rogue Drone, with this being fully articulated it allows them a large degree of movement. This gives them the ability to track signals with an extreme degree of sensitivity with no signal degradation over a short range of 5.4 Kilometers. These sensors have a very high signal bandwidth capacity, presumably used when communicating with other Drones and the Hive itself.

The main Engines are based on an unknown design which appears to somehow manipulate local space in a ways similar to a micro warpdrive, these engines are mounted directly to the rear of the Rogue Drones main hull inside of multiple cone like structures and have the capacity to boost the drone up to a speed of 550 Meters Per Second whilst still maintaining a good level of agility, in addition this drone also features a fully operation warp drive which has a similar performance to standard Empire warp drives apart from an increased energy efficiency rating.

All of the systems that make up this drone appear to be made from unique alloys of Rogue Drone design.

The main hull is composed of a alloy made up from tritanium, pyerite and mexallon, the result of which is an extremely hard yet pliable material with some bio-chemical properties. This Condensed Alloy is the basic building material in almost all Rogue Drones and their structures, how they created such an alloy is unknown but it does possess many unique properties which are beneficial in A.I. systems.

Armaments

Mounted on the end of the exterior spine inside of the weapon pod, this Rogue Drone is equipped with a Pulse Laser weapon with a range of 6,000 Meters, this short range is due in part to the weapon systems power level and the nature of this pulse laser design, being intended for close range combat it is designed to fire quickly with large capacitors integrated into it to store the power used to charge the weapon.

The advantage of a Pulse Laser over any other weapon systems is its relatively low power consumtion and it requires very little in the way of maintenance or logistic support when deployed in the field.

At the end of this Drones tail is a large claw like appendage that has a very high strength rating, we theorise that this claw is not used in combat as it lacks articulation beyond the basic grasping motion thus making it inefficient at tearing into a target, so it is believed that this claw is most likely deployed in non combat situations such as construction or demolition work and only used in combat as a last resort.

Behaviour & Intelligence

During combat encounters this Rogue Drone acts in a Command & Control capacity, coordinating all the other Rogue Drones under its command to best achieve their mission objectives utilizing its powerfull sensors it then scans space continuously and feeds the information directly back to the Hive to be disseminated amongst all other Rogue Drones of the Hive. This can give the Hive and its various Rogue Drones a great edge in combat as any weakness detected in any target is quickly exploited by all Rogue Drones attacking it to maximum effect.

This Rogue Drone displays a small survival instinct, preferring to utilize other Rogue Drones under its control (those of non "Sentient" designation) to achieve the mission goals and to sacrifice themselves to achieve this, with "Sentient" Rogue Drones only sacrificing themselves as a last resort.

Results

The results of our research has provided us with a wealth of information, which we have formatted into current standards used in Capsuleer ships for ease of comparrison.

Performance

This particular Rogue Drone is similar in performance to the Tech I Frigates of the Caldari State and as such it will be compared to that selection of Frigate types.

The sensors are comparable to all types of Caldari Tech I Frigates, with all of the frigates possessing stronger sensors. However the Rogue Drone array is outfitted with two types of sensors as opposed to the one type of sensor that Empire ships are typically fitted with, this makes this Rogue Drone much more resistant to standard ECM jamming techniques as two different ECM types must be used in conjunction to guarantee a successful jamming attempt. The scan resolution of this Rogue Drone is 300mm higher then the top of the range Caldari Frigate but the maximum sensor range that it is able to aquire a target lock is only around a fifth the range of a mid-range Frigate, which overall gives this Rogue Drone an excellent electronic and sensor suite at short range.

Shield capacity is comparable to the mid-range Frigates but its damage resistance rating is inferior to all Caldari Tech I Frigates, this Rogue Drone appears to be designed for the shields to be its primary defence with its armor only having around a fifth of the strength of the Caldari Tech I Frigates with inferior damage resistances across the board.

With all these systems packed into the Hull of this Rogue Drone there is little structure at all as most of the components are connected directly to one another, due to this peculiar design this Rogue Drone has less then a third the structural support of any of the Caldari Tech I Frigates. This also contributes towards this Rogue Drones signature radius which is comparable to that of the best Caldari Tech I Frigates and this Rogue Drone can achieve speeds which are more then 100m/s faster then that of the top of the range Caldari Tech I Frigates.

Conclussions

Operating in a Command & Control capacity this Rogue Drone has similar performance to standard Caldari Tech I Frigates and as such when confronted in combat by a competent Capsuleer pilot in a basic Tech I Frigate there should be little to no risk involved for that pilot, only in large numbers and in conjunction with other Rogue Drone types does this drone then become a risk as its high speed and powerful sensors can cause it to become a serious threat to Tech I Frigates as it continuously scans the target an shares the information with the Hive which then quickly adapts it tactics to exploit these weaknesses.

Capsuleers should however be wary of "Sentient" Rogue Drone types as they seem to possess the ability to change tactics on the fly and this can lead to ambushes and possible Ewar attacks on the unwary pilot. Using Tech II or Faction Frigate however makes engaging this Rogue Drone almost risk free, even in large numbers and amongst other Rogue Drone types.

Threat Assessment: MODERATE