Escort Duty

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DRG:RC

DRG:S

OverviewMissionsEscort

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Updated for U36

Escort Duty is a mission type in Deep Rock Galactic.

“	This time we are after an Ommoran Heartstone! In order to extract it, we are sending in an autonomous Drilldozer to support you. The Drilldozer will automatically home in on the Heartstone, so your job will be to escort it and keep it running. Good luck, miners!
	— Mission Control

Escort the Drilldozer while it makes its way to the Ommoran Heartstone.

Protect the Drilldozer

Escort Duty involves escorting a Drilldozer (also known as the Dozer, and affectionately named "Doretta" by the Dwarves), a large automated drilling machine, protecting it from attacking Creatures and repairing damage done to it. The Drilldozer's health is segmented into three parts: the left side, right side, and body. The left side will take damage until it breaks, then the right side, then the body. Damage dealt to any part of the Drilldozer will only affect the active segment. However, it can only be repaired from the area of the Drilldozer it maps to. When a segment reaches 0%, Mission Control will announce that the Drilldozer has taken permanent damage. The damaged segment cannot be repaired anymore and the next segment will begin taking damage. If the Drilldozer's body runs out of health, the mission fails.

Drilling Phases

At the beginning of the mission, the Drilldozer arrives inside a large cargo container which must be manually opened by pressing a button. Once open, the Drilldozer can be started by pressing a button on the back.

Each time the Drilldozer is started and begins drilling forward through the map, a Swarm will begin. The swarm lasts until the Drilldozer stops moving, and the end of the swarm is not announced by Mission Control.

The Drilldozer's speed is determined by how many Creatures and Dwarves are nearby. The more Creatures are present, the slower it will move, leaving it more vulnerable to attack.

Fuel Stops

Fuel tank in use.

When the Drilldozer runs out of fuel, it must be refueled by extracting oil from Oil Shale. This is done using the Fuel Canisters taken from back of the Drilldozer. The beams emitted from the Canisters liquefy the shale, which automatically collects the fuel. Oil Shale can be mined normally (though it requires four pickaxe hits to break), but Dwarves cannot pick up the chunks. However, the Canisters can pick up the chunks in a manner similar to intact shale. Once a Canister is filled, it must be inserted back into the Drilldozer. When it is fully refueled, the Drilldozer must be manually restarted.

While the Drilldozer is stopped and waiting for fuel, it is possible for Swarms to occur. Inserting both filled canisters into the Drilldozer will immediately stop an ongoing swarm, although timed waves of ambient bugs can still occur.

The number of fuel stops is determined by the Mission Length. Escort missions of Length 2 will have one refuel stop, while missions of Length 3 will have two refuel stops.

Ommoran Heartstone

The Drilldozer will eventually arrive at the Ommoran Heartstone, a large spherical structure. After reaching the Ommoran Heartstone, timed Swarms will no longer occur, but ambient waves of bugs can occasionally spawn.

The Drilldozer must be manually started again to begin drilling into the Heartstone. Swarms will spawn frequently throughout this entire process. The Ommoran Shell's lifebar is divided in 4 parts, each indicating a new phase. The first two phases last about 60s each, the next phase lasts about 75s, and the last phase lasts about 100s, for a total of ~300 seconds (5 minutes) considering the interval between the different phases. Each time a phase ends, the Heartstone releases an explosion which will heavily damage the players the closer they are to the drilled part of the core, as well as causing a severe amount of knockback. The explosion will also cause damage to the Drilldozer.

During each of the second and fourth phases, the Heartstone will perform one of three attacks:

Flying Rocks: The Heartstone will summon large floating rocks that target the Drilldozer. These will deal a large amount of damage to the Drilldozer, as well as any Dwarf caught in their attack. However, they can be destroyed before they hit the Drilldozer.

Ommoran Beamers: The Heartstone will summon large destructible crystal towers around itself which fire laser beams at the Drilldozer, dealing constant damage to it, but are unable to damage Dwarves.

Ommoran Crystal Traps: During this attack, the Heartstone will appear to be shrouded in a field of red energy. One Dwarf will be targeted with a beam, indicating that the Heartstone will attempt to encase them in a large destructible rock. While Dwarves are not damaged by these traps, if the targeted Dwarf is standing close to the Drilldozer, the crystal trap will deal a massive amount of damage to it. The traps can target players even if they are downed.

Doretta being damaged by an Ommoran Beamer.

The Ommoran Heartstone sequence will occur as follows:

Phase One: Swarm trigger.

Phase Two: The Heartstone begins to perform a random one of its attacks.

Phase Three: The Heartstone will cease its attack, but another swarm is triggered.

Phase Four: The Heartstone performs a different attack from the one it used during the second phase. On top of this, another swarm is triggered.

At the conclusion of Phase 4, The Heartstone will emit a shockwave that instantly kills all nearby enemies. The Heartstone can then be extracted and strapped onto the back of the M.U.L.E., where Drop Pod extraction process can begin. The Drilldozer is retired at this point and must be left behind, though its "head" will detach, and is able to be carried by the Dwarves to the Drop Pod.

Combat

Flying Rock

Effective Health Scaling		Hazard Level
		Normal Mission								DD			EDD
		1	2	3	4	5	TE 1	TE 2		3	3.5		4.5	5	5.5
Player Count	to	175	250	275	300	300	300	399		275	275		300	300	300

Flying Rock

Suicide Slam

AoE Attack
Area Damage		Hazard Level
		Normal Mission								DD			EDD
		1	2	3	4	5	PV 1	PV 2		3	3.5		4.5	5	5.5
Player Count		25	35	60	100	140	210	280		60	75		115	140	150
		25	40	65	107.5	150	225	300		65	80		122.5	150	160
		25	45	70	115	160	240	320		70	85		130	160	170
		25	50	75	125	170	255	340		75	90		140	170	180
Details
Damage Type		Kinetic					Radius: 2.5 m Maximum Damage Radius: 2.5 m Minimum Area Damage: 100 %

Cave

Compared to the caves seen in other mission types, most of the "rooms" are not connected by tunnels or Compressed Dirt barriers. The only way to proceed is by accompanying the Drilldozer, which is programmed to follow a path to the Ommoran Heartstone. This encourages the team to stay by the Dozer and protect it. Wherever the Dozer digs creates large tunnels in its wake, which can be navigated through later and are often necessary to use for the Extraction phase. The Dozer will only ever run out of fuel in the middle of a room, making Oil Shales easier to locate and collect. The Heartstone itself is found in a larger room and is fairly easy to spot given its dark red glow.

Objectives

Primary Objective

• Escort the Drilldozer
• Refuel the Drilldozer 1-2 times
  • Continue escort
• Crack the Shell of the Ommoran Heartstone
• Return the Ommoran Heartstone

The amount of times the Drilldozer will need to be refueled depends on the mission length.

Length	Complexity	Refueling Stops	Caverns	Primary Payout	Secondary Payout
		1	5	1105 2990	260/325 909/879
		1	5	1190 3220	280/350 980/945
		2	7	1360 3680	320/400 1120/1075
		2	7	1530 4140	360/450 1260/1205

Secondary Objective

Collect 10 Alien Fossil Collect 15 Apoca Bloom Exterminate 16 Bha Barnacle Collect 20 Boolo Cap Collect 14 Ebonut

Exterminate 10 Fester Fleas Exterminate 40 Glyphid Egg Collect 12 Gunk Seed Collect 35 Hollomite

Gallery

• 

  Hologram of the Heavy Cargo Drop.
• 

  The Heavy Cargo Drop.
• 

  The opened Heavy Cargo Drop.
• 

  Doretta entering a new cave.
• 

  Doretta in the refuel stage.
• 

  Doretta fuel canister.
• 

  Fuel tank in use.
• 

  The Ommoran Heartstone.
• 

  Doretta preparing to drill out the Ommoran Heartstone.
• 

  Doretta drilling out the Ommoran Heartstone.
• 

  Doretta being damaged by an Ommoran Beamer.
• 

  Doretta completing the drilling process.
• 

  The extracted Heartstone.
• 

  The Heartstone after being deposited on the M.U.L.E..

Trivia

• This mission type was added in Update 32: Roughnecks At Work.
• Repairing the Drilldozer uses various tools instead of the typical hammer used when constructing/repairing objects, including a pipe wrench and an oil can.
• It is possible to pet the Drilldozer by pressing the [USE] ("E" by default) key on its "head", found at the top of its body behind the drill.
• If the Drilldozer's head is carried into the Drop Pod during extraction, it subsequently appears on the mission end screen and in the Space Rig next to the Equipment Terminal.
• Pressing the Salute key while holding a Fuel Canister causes the dwarf to say a beer-holding salute line.