Unit Spotlight: Drone
Statistics
- Cost
- 50 Minerals
- 12 Second Build Time
- 1 Larvae
- 1 Supply
- Combat
- Each Attack Deals 5 Damage
- DPS: 4.67
- Melee Range
- 40 HP
- Sight: 8 Range
- Speed: 3.94
- Cargo Size: 1
- Tags
- Biological
- Light
Strengths
Drones are the most important unit in the game for a Zerg player. Drones and new hatcheries are the only way the increase your mineral and gas income. This means having more drones is always a good thing. Drones are a good thing to be building at almost all points in every game, more drones allows you to make more units. This is one of the most basic concepts in the game.
When are Drones Weak?
There are a few times in games where you do not want to be making drones. Here is the list of all the times you don’t want to be making drones:
- You have reached the ~80 drone goal and have 3.5-4 base saturation
- You have scouted that your opponent is going for an all-in or timing attack and you already have a better economy than them and you do not have enough units to hold the upcoming attack yet.
- You are doing an all-in or timing attack build and need to make attacking units to hit the proper timing
If none of these points are true, you should be making drones with all of your larvae. It is as simple as that and it is something that many new players can struggle with.
Further Unit Analysis
Make more drones is a very simple way for almost every player below master’s level to improve. Even some master’s and above level players can make more drones faster and would improve from just doing that.
The faster that you can create the desired Zerg economy (4+ Bases, ~80 Drones) the better you will be able to make huge tech switches, re-max your army after fights and control the entire late-game. So the analysis for this Zerg spotlight comes down to this: make more drones faster. Using larvae faster and making as many drones as possible in every scenario is crucial for winning games.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2IlcS7AHxM?start=1470]
