Doomed Drone

 is a unit. It's a gold producer with limited Lifespan that can be used as a cost-effective blocker or as a means to accelerate your early economy.

Strategy
Drone's transient cousin,  are a single Gold cheaper to purchase, however it has only a Lifespan of four turns.

A generates  over the course of its Lifespan, paying for itself and giving you an extra. They can be thought of as cheaper, slower, more efficient Auric Impulses. are good in both high and low economy:
 * In a high economy game, s can be extremely efficient if rightly timed. To do so,they must be able to block attack on their last turn.
 * In a low economy game, are excellent to accelerate the early game as they let you purchase tech buildings faster.

The power of the Doomed Drone, aside from its practical cost, is to soak on its last or 2nd to last turn, thus giving 1 prompt soak for, which is very efficient. This also means rushes that can expect a counter rush should stock on them instead of Drones on the early turns, to block right after the starting defense is down.

In a game with s, it is still recommended that you buy enough regular Drones to sustain your economy first, then use s to help 'curve' out your gold expenditures each turn efficiently when you start buying your Key units.

s are also practical as preventive defense. The next time you would consider buying an Engineer for defense on a future turn, instead consider buying a if you have the energy to spare. s feature the same Gold cost and Health as an Engineer (and provide the same defensive granularity), but also have the option of producing gold for a while first if it turns out that you don't need defense immediately.

Openings
Doomed Drone (1) can strengthen several openings.

Player 1 Fast Conduit: Supports early Green rush. Useful for Chrono Filter.
 * DD
 * 1) C + 11

Player 1 Econ Animus: Avoids floating 2 Gold or delaying the Animus.
 * DD
 * 1) DDE
 * 2) DDD
 * 3) DDA + 1 (or CC + 111)

Player 1 Higher Econ: High Econ.
 * DD
 * 1) DDE
 * 2) DDE + 1
 * 3) DDDD (or DDDE + 1)

Player 1 Econ Conduit Rush: Venge Cannon or Cluster Bolt rush. Defends the Drones for some time.
 * DD
 * 1) DDE
 * 2) C +111
 * 3) CDE +11
 * 4) CC +1111

Player 2 Rush: When speed is important.
 * DD
 * 1) A + 11 or BD + 1

Player 2 Fast Econ: Best opening for Player 2.
 * 1) DE + 1
 * 2) DDD
 * 3) A + 111 or DB + 11 or DDC + 1

Player 2 Higher Econ: Very smooth High Econ.
 * 1) DE + 1
 * 2) DDD
 * 3) DDEE + 1
 * 4) DDDDD

Player 2 Blastforge Rush: Early tech rush, can make Breachproof faster.
 * 1) B + 1
 * 2) Flame Animus + 1 (or Shredder or Synthetizer)

Change log

 * September 18th, 2015
 * Supply decreased from 20 to 10.
 * January 8th, 2015
 * Lifespan increased from 3 to 4.