There are 8 nullsec regions known as the drone regions or “dronelands”: Cobalt Edge, Etherium Reach, Malpais, Outer Passage, Perrigen Falls, The Kalevala Expanse, and The Spire. These regions are unique in that they don’t have any regular pirate data or relic sites outside of temporary content like metaliminal storms. They also don’t have Sleeper Caches. Instead, they have special drone data sites.
The Basics
Instead of armor plates or decryptors like regular exploration sites, drone data sites drop 2 kinds of loot: drone blueprint copies (BPCs) and assorted junk. Most of the junk is “drone poop” such as Drone Capillary Fluid. They can also drop filaments. 2 types of drone BPCs drop depending on the site: ‘Integrated’ drone BPCs and ‘Augmented’ drone BPCs. These BPCs drop in 10-run, 60-run, and 120-run variants. The drone poop’s used for manufacturing the drones, and isn’t very valuable. The blueprints, however, can be extremely valuable. We’re talking potentially billions of ISK.
A drone BPC’s faction depends on the specific drone region its site is located in:
| Regions | Faction | Drone BPCs | 10-Run Aug Without Escalation? |
| Cobalt Edge | Outer Passage | Amarr | Acolyte | Infiltrator | Praetor | No |
| Malpais | Oasa | Caldari | Hornet | Vespa | Wasp | No |
| Etherium Reach | Perrigen Falls | Gallente | Hobgoblin | Hammerhead | Ogre | Mining | Ice Harvesting | Yes, for L1 Sites |
| The Kalevala Expanse | The Spire | Minmatar | Warrior | Valkyrie | Berserker | No |
Drone data sites are a lot rarer than pirate data/relic sites found in other regions. Drone systems also tend to have a lot of signatures. High scanning skills and decent equipment are very helpful if you don’t want to rip your hair out.
Also, drone data spawning is a bit buggy and might put sites where they aren’t supposed to be:
The Escalations
Drone data sites are the only exploration sites in the game that escalate, not counting combat sites. That’s right: once you finish a drone data site you scanned down, you have a small chance to get an escalation to another drone data site a few jumps away. This escalation can be in a different region, but will have the same faction as the site that spawned it. Drone data escalations don’t appear to escalate again.
You need to hack all 3 cans to trigger an escalation, meaning that you should hack every can even if it’s empty or the site was cherry-picked.
Integrated drone BPCs drop from regular drone data sites that you scan down. Augmented BPCs drop from escalations. This means that you primarily run drone data sites for the escalations, since the sites themselves are largely worthless due to the low price of Integrated drones. The exception to this is Gallente drone data sites: non-escalation drone data sites in Etherium Reach and Perrigen Falls can drop 10-run Augmented Gallente, mining, and ice harvesting drone BPCs. This only applies to the sites that show as level 1 in the probe scanner; other non-escalation sites will only drop Integrated BPCs. This makes exploring in Etherium Reach and Perrigen Falls more consistently profitable than exploring in the other drone regions.
There’s also a neat trick you can use to double your chances for good escalation loot. Escalations last 24 hours and reset at downtime with new loot. They also don’t despawn before the 24 hours are up unless all 3 cans are hacked. This means that you can cargo scan the escalation cans, hack the 2 best ones, and come back after downtime to run the site again. That 5bil site might now be worth 10bil! Or you might get a bunch of junk both times; that’s RNG for you.
The Drones (and Other Loot)
Integrated drones are pretty worthless because they somehow deal less damage and have a weaker tank than both T2 and navy drones. On top of that, they deal split damage: partly their faction’s primary damage type and partly their secondary one. So an ‘Integrated’ Acolyte will deal split EM/thermal damage, which costs them even more damage due to not fully taking advantage of enemy resist holes.
Augmented drones, however, are very valuable. They still deal split damage, but have a lot more raw firepower and tank than T2 drones. This makes them the fastest-killing drones out there assuming the thing you’re shooting has low or relatively even resists. How valuable, you ask? As of writing, ‘Augmented’ Infiltrators cost over 75 million ISK a pop in Jita. A 60-run BPC means 4.5 billion ISK in drones, minus build and market costs of course. Fortunately, the input materials aren’t that bad and the bulk of Augmented drones’ value is in their blueprints. This means you can pull billions from a single drone data escalation if you’re lucky.
Drone poop’s pretty worthless. The best one you’ll get is Cerebral Fragments, and even then it’s not worth the cargo space.
The Sites
Scannable drone data sites are named “Abandoned Research Complex” followed by some numbers and letters. Escalations are named “Derelict Research Complex” followed by some numbers and letters. Drone data sites are much rarer than pirate data/relic sites in other regions.
Each drone region has 3 types of non-escalation drone data site. These sites appear as level 1, 2, and 3 data sites in the probe scanner, respectively:
| Signature Level | Appearance |
| I | Asteroid structure surrounded by a very pretty gas cloud |
| II | Ripped structure and debris surrounded by a yellow haze |
| III | Enormous partially finished drone superstructure surrounded by a green haze |
Every site of a particular level in a region will have the same name. For example, level 3 Amarr drone data sites in Cobalt Edge are called Abandoned Research Complex DA025:
Every non-escalation drone data site has 3 cans: 2 “High-Security Containment Facility” cans and 1 “Research and Development Laboratories” can. Each can’s type is “Metadrones” followed by an identifier unique to that type of site. The identifier ends with B, F, or N. Using the above example, an R&D Labs can in a level 3 Amarr site in Cobalt Edge will have the type Metadrones – LMH-A-1 – F.
Research and Development cans will always have type F, while HS Containment cans will always have type B or N. Every non-escalation site will have a B, F, and N can. The cans also have subtly different loot:
| Can Name | Type Identifier | Example Type | Core | Loot |
| High-Security Containment Facility | B | Metadrones – LMH-A-1 – B | 70hp Green (Easy) | 10-run and 60-run BPCs, drone poop |
| High-Security Containment Facility | N | Metadrones – LMH-A-1 – N | 50hp Green (Easy) | Drone poop |
| Research and Development Laboratories | F | Metadrones – LMH-A-1 – F | 90hp Red (Hard) | 120-run BPCs, abyss and noise filaments |
As you can see, High Security cans are easy to hack while R&D ones are far more challenging. The B can tends to have most of the site’s loot. The harder F can might have 120-run BPCs and/or filaments, or might be empty. The N can typically has junk. What this means is that if you don’t have a cargo scanner, you should go for the B can first followed by F and then N.
The Rats
You heard me! Rats.
Failing a drone data hack has a high chance to spawn a few very weak rogue drone rats. These rats will block you from performing more hacks in the site until they’re destroyed. Successfully finishing a hack also has a (low) chance to spawn the rats. Fortunately, the rats are so weak that you can easily kill them with a civilian gun while barely taking any damage, even in a covops frig. Just have some damage-dealing capability on your ship.
On the bright side, drone data cans won’t despawn if you fail the hack twice, unlike regular data/relic cans. You can keep trying as many times as you want.
Drone Ghost Sites
The drone regions might not have any relic sites or Sleeper Caches, but they do have Ghost Sites! For some reason. However, these Ghost Sites are slightly different from normal ones. Whereas normal Ghost Sites appear in the probe scanner as level 3 data sites, these ones appear as level 1 combat sites. Don’t ask me why. They’re also extremely easy to scan down, with tiny 4au spheres like the Independence drone combat site. You can easily scan these down in one pass and will probably do it by accident while scanning other signatures:
The small signature makes dronelands Ghost Sites very easy to identify without scanning anything. This means that if you want to specifically hunt Ghost Sites, the drone regions are the place to do it.
Internally, these sites are the same as regular nullsec Ghost Sites, with 3 green 70hp core “Secure Databank” cans and 1 yellow 70hp core “Secure Mainframe” can. They’re also named “[Faction] Improved Covert Research Facility” just like their counterparts. I’m not sure what determines the faction, but that’s purely cosmetic as far as loot is concerned.
And no, dronelands Ghost Sites don’t escalate.
Making ISK
Since virtually the entire ISK value of a drone data site is in its BPCs, the best drone region to explore in depends on which specific drones are in the highest demand at the time.
First thing’s first: stay out of Minmatar drone regions. This means The Kalevala Expanse and The Spire. Augmented Minmatar drones are in low demand and their BPCs just aren’t worth your time to hunt, since they only come from escalations. This does mean competition’s a lot lower, but that doesn’t compensate for how little the loot’s worth. However, low competition plus their unique appearance in the probe scanner makes the 2 Minmatar drone regions the best place to hunt Ghost Sites if that’s your thing.
The Amarr drone regions of Cobalt Edge and Outer Passage have the best potential escalation loot followed by the Caldari regions of Malpais and Oasa. You’ll likely see less competition for Caldari drone data sites though. The Gallente drone regions of Etherium Reach and Perrigen Falls have considerably lower potential escalation jackpots due to lower demand for their Augmented drones. However, they’re way more consistent than the other drone regions due to their L1 sites having 10-run Augmented BPCs. You’ll still get a decent haul from running Gallente drone datas even if you don’t get a single escalation. This also makes Gallente drone space fairly contested, so keep that in mind.
I recommend exploring in the Amarr or Caldari drone regions if you have time for a long session to try getting some escalations. If you don’t feel like gambling for escalations, the Gallente drone regions are the best choice (despite their high site competition). The Minmatar drone regions are only good if you specifically want to run Ghost Sites due to lower competition, though every drone region’s great for Ghost Sites because of how easy it is to find and scan them down.
Since your loot’s a bunch of blueprint copies, you need to either make a contract or build and sell the drones to get your ISK. I suggest just bundling Integrated BPCs together and dumping them in a bargain contract. Try to undercut any existing contracts. Sooner or later, someone’s bound to snatch it up. Augmented drones on the other hand are usually valuable enough that it’s worth your time to build them if you can. If you don’t want to do that, just list it in its own contract. Augmented Minmatar drone BPCs will likely take longer to sell than other factions’.
The Bottom Line
Like metaliminal storms, drone data sites can be a nice change of pace from regular exploration, especially for experienced players who go through signatures like candy. However, making decent money off these sites is very dependent on both getting escalations in the first place and getting decent loot from said escalations. Being able to reroll escalations once only helps so much when the base sites are rare, the escalations are rarer, and good loot isn’t guaranteed. Making ISK via blueprints also requires more effort than just dumping to a Jita buy order.
Drone space also has a lot of signatures, which along with drone data sites’ rarity makes them difficult to find. This isn’t a big deal for players with high probe strength and good equipment, but it means it can take a new player ages just to find one drone data site that’s probably going to have junk loot with no escalation. For these reasons, I don’t recommend dronelands exploration for new players. Just go anywhere else instead (except hisec).