Drone swarm

The Drone swarm is a common GDI air unit in Command & Conquer: Rivals.

Background
The drone swarm is an outgrowth of Dr. Liang’s research into pilotless aircraft. The drone swarm is armed with a light machine gun for front line combat duty. Dr. Liang objected to weaponizing his drone technology but was ultimately countermanded by General Solomon.

Abilities

 * Flying
 * Flying

Game unit
Drone swarm is an anti-infantry aircraft squad. Being the cheapest unit in the Helipad building with sight 3, the Drone Swarm could be considered a scouting unit, but the price of Helipad and the Swarm together is prohibitive to be a good opening unit. It's speed and damage output makes it a good counter to infantry in the early and mid game. Flying ability is useful in maps with many obstacles and choke points.

If ability to attack aircraft is required, Talon is a good replacement. For a more expensive anti-infantry aircraft, see Razorback.

Being a squad of 5, Drone swarm can be difficult to deal with for some of anti-air units, like Phantom and Stealth tank, both of which have burst of 4 rockets, leaving one drone alive, which can be just enough to hold the pad. Even Attack bikes and Pitbulls will take long time to get through the whole squad. However, rapid fire units like Buggy and Slingshot will obliterate them in no time.

Changelog

 * 2018-10-26:
 * Health increased to 300 (was 150)
 * 2018-11-06:
 * Health decreased to 284 (was 300)
 * Squad size decreased to 4 (was 5)
 * Damage to Vehicles reduced to 7 (was 20)
 * 2018-12-06: Speed decreased to Fast (was Fastest)
 * 2019-02-06:
 * Damage to Infantry increased to 30 (was 20)
 * Health decreased to 220 (was 284)
 * Speed increased to Faster (was Fast)
 * 2019-04-03:
 * Damage to Infantry increased to 42 (was 30)
 * Squad size increased to 5 (was 4)
 * Health decreased to 200 (was 284)
 * Vision increased to 3 (was 2)
 * 2019-06-05: Health decreased to 175 (was 200)
 * 2019-06-27: Life decreased to 127 (was 175)
 * 2019-09-12: Movement speed increased to 8 (was 6.928)

Behind the scenes
"Our intent with the Drone Swarm is to provide a Helipad opener option to players wishing to go heavy air builds. This is the first in a series of units we’re planning on adding to help increase early game diversity."

- MrBlack

Trivia

 * Initially Drone swarms cost less and did less damage, thus making them proper scouting unit, but they later got buffed.
 * Mechanical sounds. When given orders, emits high pitch electric/mechanical noise. When ordered to do impossible or unfavorable things, emits low pitch noises.