How do you use freight drones? [AP]

[Fenris321]

I bought 10 freight drones and went to test them out. I'm in a Griffon (with 9 ships docked in case that matters) and plenty of empty cargo space. I launched two drones and told them to collect wares in sector, which they did. I then told them to return home and watched for some time as they just flew around in circles coming nowhere close to my Griffon. Then just in case they were still looking for wares in sector, I gave them the stop command and then told them to return home again, still didn't work. I told them to stop then follow me which they did, when they got within 1k I told them to return home and they promptly flew off again. So then I told them to once again follow me (my plan was to tell them to stop then try to manually pick them up), before they got to me they expired (I'd been running SETA).

The more I think about it the more I'm thinking that because they had cargo they couldn't go into my cargo bay but needed a place to dock and unload before being moved into cargo once again. Is this correct? Or am I just missing something?

[Honved]

A freight drone needs a landing bay to dock automatically. If your ship can't dock fighters, then you need to tell the drone to stop, and manually "run it over" to collect it.

Normally, I consider 1 or 2 Freight Drones to be useful on a capital ship that can dock fighters, but only semi-useful on ones that can't. Any more than 1 or 2 and they're "niche" items, in my opinion. I can collect most high-value dropped wares faster with an M5 fighter (which can also take them elsewhere for sale or storage), and one or two freight drones (or a TS "local trader" in the vicinity) are usually sufficient to "cherry pick" the best of the bulk goods.

[Fenris321]

Ahh, I see. I wanted them mostly for docking at stations where the Griffon can't fit. I have a Mercury set aside just for doing this now, but figured it'd be quicker using drones instead of having the Mercury jump into a sector, land at the station, buy the items, then docking up to a station where the Griffon can fit and then transferring items.

I'll try it again by launching the fighters and having them protect the Griffon before issuing the commands to have the drones dock and see how that works.

Thanks,

[Alan Phipps]

If there is no immediate hostile threat then the fighters set to protect the Griffon will just redock at it and fill the bays again. Get rid of one fighter to leave a bay free and you should be OK to use several freight drones. When each drone lands it immediately goes back into cargo and so clears the docking bay for the next drone to dock.

[ancienthighway]

Freight drones are rather slow, most small transports are faster. On the other hand, when you initiate a trade with freight drones (your stations only), the drone flies to the station, makes the pick up, and is back on board almost instantaneously. My big ships a few for refueling purposes, even those without docking bays because of the way the trade with drones works.

There is a script that speeds up the freight drone and allows you to trade with AI stations.

[whatmustido]

If you're flying a Griffin and you don't mind changing one or two of your docked ships, you could use something like a falcon hauler or blastclaw prototype to ferry goods around. I started keeping those on my TLs so I can quickly fill them up with energy cells.