Hunting the Drudge Factory

Site Details

Hunting the Drudge Factory
Type	Expedition
Rating	Unrated
Found in	High, Low
Max ship size	No limit
Faction	Rogue Drones
Best damage to deal	EM Th
Damage to resist	Ex Kin Th
Sig. strength	N/A

Hunting the Drudge Factory is an expedition that escalates from Chemical Yard.

Overview

Expedition start message
As you decimate the last remnants of this rogue drone base, your sensors come across some old transportation data; lists of materials, modules, ships and locations. The only reason this is a kind of odd is that rogue drones usually are very self sufficient, making in situ what they need for their colonies. Perhaps this is nothing...

Walkthrough

Location #1 (ungated)

Initial defenders (4-8km)

		WD	EWAR	L
	5-8 x Frigate Devilfish/... Alvi
	2-3 x Elite Frigate Strain Decimator/Infestor/Render/Splinter Alvi
	4 x Cruiser Annihilator Alvum
	1 x Commander Destroyer Sentient Marauder/... Alvior

Sansha ships have been confirmed to spawn as of 7 Sep YC124. They spawn after the Rogue Drone cruisers are destroyed (not on timer).

• Note: Tackler frigates (WD) in this and next locations have lowest resistance EM of 60%+ so proceed with caution. They also attack drones. (as of Sept. YC124)

Wave #2 (22-25km)

		WD	EWAR	L
	2-4 x Destroyer Centior Cannibal/Misshape
	4 x Cruiser Centum Beast/Juggernaut

Escalation message
Arriving at the most recent location in the files, you come across a blown out rogue drone hive, someone must have been here before you. Thankfully there are a couple of other locations in those files that make any sense to your navigation systems, the closer one being...

Expedition dead-end message
Arriving at the only recognizable location in the files you found, you come across a blown out rogue drone hive. Whatever this once was, it obviously is no more....

Bounty: ± 681K ISK

Location #2 (ungated)

• Simple warp-in triggers escalation.

---

Initial defenders (5km)

		WD	EWAR	L
	2 x Battlecruiser Defeater/... Alvatis
	1 x Commander Cruiser Sentient Destructor/... Alvum

Escalation message
Arriving at one of the remaining locations in the files, you come across a blown out rogue drone hive, someone must have been here before you. There is one other location here that makes any sense to your navigation systems.

Bounty: ± 1.1 Mil ISK

Location #3 (ungated)

---

Simple warp-in and moving a bit can trigger an escalation. The pocket is empty on warpin; the commander group must be manually spawned by approaching the Ruined Drone Post structures.

Commander spawn (20-25km, triggered by approaching Ruined Drone Post structures)

		WD	EWAR	L
	5 x Frigate Devilfish/... Alvi
	0-3 x Elite Frigate Strain Barracuda/Hunter/... Alvi
	0-3 x Elite Frigate Strain Decimator/Infestor/Render/Splinter Alvi
	3 x Destroyer Dismantler/... Alvior
	1 x Commander Cruiser Sentient Destructor/... Alvum

Structures

		WD	EWAR	L
	4 x Ruined Drone Post

Escalation message
Well, that was a surprise. Rogue drones, turned carebears and mining their cogs off! Why? Perhaps this navigational beacon will lead you to some answers.

Expedition dead-end message
Well, that was a surprise. Rogue drones, turned carebears and mining their cogs off! Why? Perhaps this navigational beacon could have lead you to some answers, but it seems to have been damaged in the heat of battle.

Bounty: ± 970K ISK

Location #4 (lowsec, possibly highsec, observed 6/5/2018, ungated)

---

Initial defenders (5-10km)

		WD	EWAR	L
	0-3 x Elite Frigate Strain Barracude/... Alvi
	0-3 x Elite Frigate Strain Decimator/Infestor/Render/Splinter Alvi
	5 x Cruiser Violator/... Alvum

Wave #1 (20-25km)

		WD	EWAR	L
	0-2 x Elite Frigate Strain Barracude/... Alvi
	0-2 x Elite Frigate Strain Decimator/Infestor/Render/Splinter Alvi
	2 x Cruiser Violator/... Alvum
	1 x Elite Cruiser Viral Infector/... Alvum
Commander part
	1+ x Cruiser Drone Guards
	3 x Battlecruiser Drone Guards
	1 x Overseer Cruiser Hive Overseer

Container #1	Empty
Container #2	Empty
Container #3	Empty
Container #4	5th Tier Overseer's Personal Effects
Container #5	Empty
Container #6	5th Tier Overseer's Personal Effects

• Note: Hive Overseer drops ONLY T2 salvage parts as loot. Genius !

• Footnote: Without going into too much details, that whole expedition SUCKS ! Much travel (32+ jumps), small rewards, Empty containers, have fun. Read [possible reward] as [next to nothing].

Commander and other valuable loot

Item Name	Est. Value	Note
Drone Parts		100% drop rate
T2 salvage		From Hive Overseer
Rogue Drone 46-X Nexus Chip	52M ISK	From Sentient drones
Rogue Drone 43-X Nexus Chip	52M ISK	From Sentient drones

Exploration logs

Date	Loot	Est. value	Comments
June 8, 2020	Rogue Drone 46-X Nexus Chip	52M ISK	From 1st location (Sentient Marauder Alvior)
March 25, 2021	Rogue Drone 43-X Nexus Chip	150M ISK	From 2nd location (Sentient Destructor)
Sept. 08, 2022	Drone Capillary and Synaptic	below 1M ISK	From ALL 4 locations
Jan. 16, 2023	Rogue Drone 46-X Nexus Chip	47M ISK	From 1st location (Sentient Marauder Alvior)

Expedition complete message

Rogue drones mining and gathering resources far and wide to supply a huge drone factory! This scale of operations does not seem to fit anything you have seen or heard about them before and this level of organization kind of takes the "rogue" out of "rogue drones". You are pretty sure that somewhere, some authority would love to get a report on this. But on second thought... all the paperwork involved would probably be enough to exhaust a black hole.

Bounty: ± 1.4 Mil ISK

Total Bounty for all four sites: ± 4.1 Mil ISK

Escalation

This site can escalate to Hunting the Drudge Factory again.