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Mining drone lost


bikertaz
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I know this topic has been visited in previous posts, but I was not sure if it had been completely resolved.

- Mining drone deployed on Earth (somewhere up in Siberia).

- Shuttle RTB's and CC leaves Earth space to patrol Alpha Centauri region.

- Return to Earth, I zoom in to region where mining drone was deployed, try to zoom to "Support Crafts" and no drone appears in the list.

- Knowing it should be there, I tried deploying a shuttle anyway to retrieve it. Says it can't find it.

- Go to Tactical->Loadout->SC2->Drone2, and it says that it's current location is on Earth and it is 100% full.

I assume this is a case where the drone ran through the surface mesh and is now inverted somewhere in the region. Is there a way to either retrieve it or destroy it so that I can buy another? Or am I just SOL for what I assume was deploying on bad terrain?

I have game saves available. I also apologize for my somewhat empty system profile. I plan to remedy that tonight.

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OK. I updated to v2.00.20 and still have the same problem. I hadn't updated previously because the VCF did not indicate that it addressed this topic between RC19 and RC20, and since I have dialup at home, I put off the update.

Aside from that, am I stuck with a missing drone?

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You could try going to tacops, click Earth, Observe, zoom down a couple levels (I would suggest clicking a base or city region so you can get a feel for the zoom level), right click the mouse and hold, tilt the map, then pan around to see if you can locate the TTD of the drone.

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You could try to fly into the area with your AE as a pilot and "manually" locate it by switching between targets, but, due to the radar limitations, that may not work, especially, if the drone was there for too long and might have wondered outside the mission zone.

Also, in TACOPS try to zoom in slightly above the ground level then pan the camera parallel to the surface, point it, for example, north and start playing with different filter options, when done point it NE then E and so on around the clock.

It looks like you've got yourself a real SAR mission. By the time you're done with all the options the drone will wear itself out and eventually self-destruct so you could buy a new one.

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quote:


Originally posted by bikertaz:

OK. I updated to v2.00.20 and still have the same problem. I hadn't updated previously because the VCF did not indicate that it addressed this topic between RC19 and RC20, and since I have dialup at home, I put off the update.

Aside from that, am I stuck with a missing drone?


If its not a bug or hasn't been fixed, it won't appear in the VCF. Just because you write it up, doesn't make it a bug until it can be 100% reproduced.

Drones don't get lost. They are either destroyed or out of range.

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As long as you know which planet it's on, there are two ways to retrieve a "lost" mining drone:

1. Go down to the planet yourself, in an empty shuttle. Land anywhere. Select the option to retrieve the appropriate drone.

2. Put a pilot in an empty shuttle. Set two waypoints for anywhere on the planet. Orders for the first waypoint should be to continue on to the second waypoint. Orders for the second waypoint should be to retrieve the appropriate drone.

Using either of those methods, you can attempt to retrieve the drone without ever actually targeting it. If they don't work, you're pretty much out of luck. You're probably on the wrong planet. If not, nuke the planet out of existence and see if it destroys the drone at the same time.

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bikertaz... I just had the same problem. I've had them wander out of range before and you just do what Chavik and Skydive give as solutions. In my case this time, I go to the planet view > zoom > support units... and it only shows 3 drones (knowing *&^% well I put 4 here). Next I check Tactical computer > Loadout > SC > 1 > drone > select drone 1 from pulldown... it shows DEPLOYED, 100%, MOON-02-FULL. I have tried twice to retrieve mdrone1 to no avail. Even if I try to extract with myself as pilot of shuttle, when I select DRONE > EXTRACT... it only shows DRN-2, DRN-3, DRN-4 (and again, according to TAC COMPUTER, the drone is on Moon-02.)

and before you get defensive SC... We're not saying it is faulty programming -- glitches happen once in a while. We're just looking for possible solutions to retrieve, destroy/replace the $$#@% thing.

quote:

By the time you're done with all the options the drone will wear itself out and eventually self-destruct

How long does it take before it self-destructs?

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quote:


Originally posted by Severian:

and before you get defensive SC... We're not saying it is faulty programming -- glitches happen once in a while. We're just looking for possible solutions to retrieve, destroy/replace the $$#@% thing.


You really do think I care about whether or not you think I'm being defensive? You're kidding me, right?

Here's the deal, if its a bug and can be reproduced by one of my guys - or myself - then we'll look into it.

Considering that n00bs to the game have NO clue what they're doing for the first, oh, six months, I don't usually pay attention to the call of the wolf because its been proven time and time again around here, thats its a bloody waste of time.

If you're on the SAME planet or moon as the drone - AND you are within range of it, you will be able to extract it. Its THAT simple.

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Note that nowhere in my previous posts did I suggest this is a bug. I knew about the previous issues with drones from other posts so I wanted to bring the topic under discussion to try to find out if it was my experience level or a game issue.

Thanks for the suggestions. I'll give those a try. By the way, is there somewhere that indicates how close you need to be to a drone to find it?

By the way, I did try several times to land a shuttle and extract the drone without targeting it. My shuttle pilot just tells me the drone isn't there.

And while I am a n00b at UC, I did play BC3K quite a bit several years ago. I feel I do know my way around the game reasonably well since the general scheme of things hasn't changed.

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OK, I tried out the suggestions posted above with no luck. I zoomed TACOPS down near the surface and panned 360 degrees while looking at the horizon. All I ever see are 2 bases, one TER/MIL and the other TER/INS (perhaps I'm not at the correct zoom level). I tried manually piloting a shuttle down with the same result. I even droned around for quite a while looking to see if I could find it. It still shows up in TACTICAL as deployed and on Earth.

Guess I'm out of luck. I was looking for a reason to re-start anyway, so I'll take the easy way out and bail.

Thanks for the help guys.

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OK, I'll try to send them tonight after I get home from work.

One thought that occurred to me: it seems like most of the people that have had this happen were deploying multiple mining drones in one region. I had 2 deployed, and was able to extract 1. Not sure if that might have something to do with it.

I'm prepared to face the wrath of the SC if I did do something stupid. I appreciate you taking time to address this though.

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  • 4 weeks later...

I have also lost a drone. I accept that I MUST be in range to pick it up and I have/am continuing to try the 2 methods mentioned above to locate the drone. SAR while I go.

My question is this..

How long before the drone self-destructs?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

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  • 3 weeks later...

n00b, and first time posting. I'm up to 2 MIA mining drones. They were on the priority list and after recovering next drone, poof, they were gone. I tried the above methods for finding the first missing drone, but no joy. I don't mind buying new drones, but I can't load them till the others go away. Right now there are 2 big fat drones at 100% just waiting for an extract.

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quote:


Originally posted by 6case:

n00b, and first time posting. I'm up to 2 MIA mining drones.


Then you're not running the latest version. And if you are, you are using a previous game in which they were already lost.

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No, and no. UC n00b, but not at gaming. After installation I immediately updated using the two patches supplied by the 3000AD website. I have V2.00.27 installed, and I ran through the tutorial. The I started in ROAM to get a feel for the different space craft, and get some cash mining. My SOP is extract DRN X, unload DRN X, deploy DRN X, target DRN X, and make DRN X priority. Following next DRN targeting the previous drone was already missing. Additionally, I am up to three missing drones. At that point I ended that character, but I have the saved game for the 2 missing drones on Moon-Deimos.

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