Drone

"Drones and drone stations were inspired by bees; drones buzz around the ranch to complete their task and like to recharge in their flower-shaped stations once their job is complete. When a drone returns to its station it will go to sleep until it is time to get back to work. Wake up, little drone!"

- Teaser announcement

The Drone is a player-created Utility gadget crafted at the fabricator at The Lab. Unlike most other utilities, placing it down does not require a two minute installation cooldown before it can be used, nor can it be installed anywhere outside The Ranch and its expansions.

Up to two Drones can be installed in each Ranch expansion. Due to this, a maximum total of 14 Drones can be used at any one time. In addition they can be recolored using the Tech Chroma Pack, and have Fashion Pods applied to it.

Acquisition


The blueprint for the Drone is purchaseable from The Lab for 2,000, as soon as The Lab becomes accessible.

Usage
A Drone and its flower station is the most versatile Gadget that can be installed on The Ranch due to its programmable nature. It can be used to feed slimes, store or sell plorts, or keep the ranch tidy. When idle, the Drone rests on top of the flower in an inactive state. It has a single stack inventory of 50 units.

The station has a button in front of it which can be interacted with to program the Drone, and has a water gauge which indicates how much charge the Drone has left, and when empty the Drone will not function. The water gauge can be completely refilled by splashing it with a single blob of Water, and if the Drone is sleeping on the flower and has tasks that can be completed when splashed, it will wake up and resume them. The water will deplete in a day, regardless of whether or not the Drone has been active.

Programming the Drone requires that it be given three tasks to execute: Target, Source, and Destination. All three tasks must be given to it - and then activated - for the Drone to function. It will not activate if the Drone cannot perform the task it has been given. Likewise, if it cannot access its Destination after performing a task - such as a Silo getting demolished when its destination is set to storing items in a Silo - it will drop its cargo before deciding whether to go back to its flower, or perform its programmed task again if its Destination is restored.

Target
The Target option tells the Drone what it will focus on collecting.

The Drone can collect Plorts, Veggies, Fruit, Meat, and Elder Chickens. In addition, it can be programmed to target a specific item, such as a Mint Mango or a Mosaic Plort.

Once a Drone has a target, the top right readout when hovering the crosshair over the Drone will indicate what category of items the Drone is programmed to collect.

Source
The Source option indicates where the Drone will gather the resources it is set to collect from.


 * When Plorts or a specific plort is selected, it is capable of collecting from Corrals, Ponds, Incinerators, Silos, Plort Collectors, and.
 * When a Food category or a specific food item is selected, it can collect from Gardens/Coops, Silos, and Outside Plots.

Destination
The Destination option tells the Drone what it is to do with the resources it has acquired.


 * Plorts can be deposited into a Silo, or sold at the Plort Market.
 * Food can be taken directly to Corrals, deposited into Silos, deposited into Auto-feeders, or burned at Incinerators.

Example
This is an example of a programmed Drone; it has been programmed to collect Fire Plorts from Incinerators, and place them into a Silo.



Limitations

 * If a Drone is reprogrammed or reset in the middle of performing a task, or runs out of water, any cargo it was carrying will be dropped onto the floor before flying back to its flower.
 * Up to two Drones can be placed in a single Ranch expansion, and the Drones can only function within that expansion; a Drone placed in The Docks will only ever be able to collect resources in The Docks. Due to this, they can only sell plorts if a Market Link is placed nearby.
 * They cannot go through teleporters.
 * When a Drone is programmed to collect items from Outside Plot, it will completely ignore any resources left within the boundaries of plots. Likewise, if told to collect resources from inside plots, it will ignore any resources that have fallen out.
 * The waterfall in The Docks and the river in Mochi's Manor are not recognised as Ponds; they must be collected by selecting Outside Plot.
 * Drones cannot be told to collect Plorts from Gardens.
 * The Drones cannot utilise Warp Depots, or deposit items into the Refinery or Refinery Links.

Bugs

 * A Drone can overfill Silos and Auto-feeders past their maximum storage capacity. Any additional amounts will come up with a "+".
 * A Drone set to sell plorts will not recognise the Plort Market or Market Link when it is resetting its prices between 0:00am and 0:05am, and will drop its cargo.

Changelog

 * 1.3.1 - Drones got a nice little update that allows them to deliver to the Refinery and improves how they interact with some targets/destinations!
 * Refinery and Refinery Link have been added as a destination—for science!
 * Updated “Outside Plots” to a new “Free Range” option. Drones set to “Free Range” will collect the target item from anywhere on the ranch expansion that is not in storage (e.g. Silos, Plort Collectors).
 * Updated programming interface to clarify that drones can deliver to the Plort Market via Market Links when you’re in another ranch expansion. The destination will dynamically update to either read “Plort Market” or “Market Link” depending on where you are.
 * Updated incinerator programming so they now serve the sole purpose of feeding fire slimes rather than infinitely destroying items. Drones will only deliver food to incinerators until the ash trough is full. If you’re looking to burn two thousand carrots because you really hate carrots, you’re going to have to do that manually. But come on, they’re just carrots.
 * Drones are now able to deliver food directly from silos to corrals.
 * 1.3.0b - Fixed bug where drones could get stuck on gordos and slime toys
 * Fixed bug where drones sometimes did not properly perform their behaviors while the player was knocked out.
 * Fixed bug where some drone behaviors were performing extra times while sleeping.
 * Fixed bug resulting in drones sometimes trying to take a position inside the archways on the docks
 * Optimized some drone plort-selling behavior.
 * 1.3.0 - Implemented.

Trivia

 * Drones are based on bees; its behavior of collecting resources is heavily based on bees collecting nectar. The term "Drone" is a double entendre; referencing both the male bee referred to as a drone, although its role is more reminiscent of worker bees than true drones, and the common name for a remote-controlled pilotless aircraft. Beatrix - herself resembling a bee due to her Vacpack - programming the Drones to perform tasks may reference the relationship between a queen and her worker bees. The key on top of the drone resembles the keys used in Wind-up toys, and the common shape for bee's wings drawn in a cartoon style.
 * Drones were originally intended to be released alongside Mochi's Megabucks Update. However it was changed to be its own update to give it more developmental focus, pushing back Viktor's Experimental Update to Update 1.4.0.
 * Prior to their release, the roadmap stated: Adorable drones will be added to Slime Science, allowing you to selectively automate parts of the ranching experience! Our goal with drones is to somewhat reduce the amount of manual work required to keep your ranch running while still retaining the spirit of the game we have now. Drones will also likely be a considerable investment, similar to teleporters as their value to the experience is high.
 * The Mochi's Extra Mile effect applies to Drones if programmed to sell plorts, although will still use the Drone icon when it is applied.