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Evolves From: Drone Evolves To: N/A Role: Lead your Hive to victory over the Marines. Use your powerful pheromones and your command abilities to organise the Hive. Lay eggs to create facehuggers and accumulate more Larvae. Use your screech to defend yourself and signal pushes. Use your acid to melt into places. Guides: Guide to Hive Building, Guide to Pheromones |
Overview
The final tier. The Queen is the most vital member of the hive. But with great power comes great responsibility, and she's often misused. Evolved from a Drone, the Queen is the mind of the Hive. Comparable to the Marine Commanding Officer, her primary function is to lead the Hive. Communication is key, and the Hive must follow her orders.
One definitive feature of the Queen is her ability to grow an ovipositor and lay eggs. Those eggs must be picked up and planted on weeds by the hive castes (Drone, Hivelord, Carrier, Queen) Eggs can only be planted near the queen in ovi. In the egg-laying mode, the Queen can toggle a more extensive vision mode, and she can overwatch a xenomorph. The Queens pheromones are centered around her (When Mobile) and the current xeno she is overwatching (When stationary, Egg laying Mode). The Xenomorphs evolution progress stops and burrowed larvae will not unburrow when the Queen is not in egg-laying mode.
Combat wise, the Queen has the second highest health of all aliens (barring the crusher who has the most health ) and can be tough to kill. She's a capable fighter when threatened, but her increased health won't typically be enough to save her from a squad of Marines if she's caught in the open. If attacked, however, her Screech ability causes nearby Marines to drop what they're holding and be stunned long enough for any assisting aliens to take down a small squad completely. The Queen also has corrosive acid on par with a spitter that allows her to open new pathways or dissolve enemy weapons quickly. Queen fighting on the frontline is both a boost to xeno fighting power and a curse if queen dies to it. The death of queen will kill half of the burrowed larvae and unburrow the rest which are likely to be killed as well if found by marines. Nothing kill a hives quicker than the first queen dying early on.
Getting started
Your first task is to find a suitable place to Grow Ovipositor. if you are new to the map, ask in hivemind (;) where a good location is. Once you have grown the ovipositor, you will start laying eggs. You can plant eggs by pick them up then click on a tile near you. One common early strategy is to assign leaders to drones (later reassign to fighting castes with fighting starts) and you emit recovery so the drones get the big plasma regen buff to spread weed and build. When you mature into an Elder Queen, remember to reset your pheromones. They do not auto-update for the leaders. Set Hive Orders for standing orders like evolution limits for T3s or simply free evolution. Use Word of the Queen announces your plans like how you want to deal with tall hosts, headhunters or before you are removing ovipositor to move to a new location. Please note that removing the ovipositor early is detrimental to the hive as it halts evolution progress. As the scouts may encounter survivors, you may consider forbid slashing (slashing is permitted by default) to ensure the hosts are alive to be infected, yet it will also be risker if the hosts are armed.
Overwatching
When you are overwatching, always keep the hive status open and click the names to see how they are doing, you can Ctrl + middle mouse click on a xeno to switch to them. Let them know your presence, xeno is decentralized compared to marines, and they need leaders to rally them and focus points of attacks because xeno, unlike marines, cannot afford to lose their numbers. The first tool you have is assigning leaders, leaders also share the Pheromones you are emitting. It is recommended that you emit warding as it greatly reduces the incoming damage for xenos. You can have two leaders first then more as you upgrade. Leader should be assigned to:
- T3/T2 as your pheromones will keep the valuable T3/T2s alive
- the most teamplay and outspoken xeno, as they can relay information to the hive and rally them
It is best to spread your pheromones. For example in LV, perhaps there are three fronts, namely barren/central river, medbay/hydro and a lurker gang in hydro road/cargo, then you should assign a leader to each of the fronts.
Another popular strategy is to name Praetorians as leaders, since they can emit their own pheromones in tandem with the Queen's. Recovery and Warding are a popular combo during prolonged battles for maximum survival, with Frenzy and Warding being excellent during pursuits as anyone receiving them are both faster and durable.
The second tool is Word of the Queen in the Alien tab, announce your (war) plan with it, likely let the hive know incoming flanks, when you are doing a flank or you are going to grow/remove ovipositor. Announce what is going on to alert the hive from time to time, use word of the queen or hivemind.
Abilities
These are abilities usable regardless of whether you are on ovipositor or not.
| Abilities: | Description: |
|---|---|
 Regurgitate |
To devour, grab a host with Ctrl + Click or
Grab intent (3 in hotkey mode) then click yourself, standstill. To stop the host from getting up and running away, you can switch to an empty hand (X in hotkey mode) and keep tackling them using Disarm intent (2 in hotkey mode) when you are devouring them. Xenos with devoured humans inside them can not vent crawl but Xenos with devoured monkeys can. Hosts with boot knives can injure the Xenomorph they are inside if they are conscious. Using this ability with a host devoured will regurgitate them back up, giving a moderate stun. (Edit this template) |
 Grow Ovipositor |
Grows or remove the ovipositor from which the queen begins to passively create eggs from.
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 Screech |
A wide area of effect stun, screeches upon activation. Any marine that can see you and is on your screen (ie: not observing you through a scope) is affected. Marines close to you will be knocked down, while those farther away will be merely unable to act for a short time. If the victim is deaf, they will not be affected by this ability.
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 Emit Pheromones |
Emit one of the three Pheromones. It is advised to emit the pheromones that are not already being emitted, as pheromones don't stack except for Frenzy pheromone. Your pheromones will grow stronger as you mature. |
| Word of the Queen | Sends a message to all aliens that is larger than standard text and can be used to announce battle plans, so your hive all know what to do when the time comes. Accessed via the Alien tab.
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| Set Hive Orders | Lets you set orders that are always visible to the rest of the hive in the stats tab. Accessed via the Alien tab.
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Mobile Abilities
| Abilities: | Description: |
|---|---|
 Rest |
Used to rest and get up. Xenos heal faster when resting on weeds. |
 Plant Purple Sac |
Can't be planted if there is already a sac on the tile. Can be removed by one slash with harm intent for re-plant.
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 Choose Resin Structure |
Click to choose what resin structure to make. The default structure is a Resin Wall. |
 Secrete Resin |
Secretes the chosen Resin Structure on your tile. As a Queen, you secrete resin faster than the Drone you evolved from.
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 Corrosive Acid |
Vomits a glob of acid on an item to dissolve it. Multiple items can be clicked at once as long as you are standing still. The cost of plasma is increased compared to drones due to how the queen has stronger corrosive acid.
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 Gut |
Gibs the mob you decide to gut. This requires you to stand adjacent to your target(No grab is needed.) and for both you and your victim to remain still during the considerable windup.
Costs 200 plasma. |
 Psychic Whisper |
Allows you to select a mob to psychically whisper to. Must have Line of Sight to the mob. |
 Toggle Spit Type |
Allows you to switch between neurotoxic spit costing 50 plasma to fire or spitting acid which costs 100 plasma to fire. |
 Xeno Spit |
Use middle mouse button to spit globs of neurotoxin or acid. |
Stationary Abilities
| Abilities: | Description: | |||||||||||
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Psychic Whisper |
Allows you to select a mob to psychically whisper to. You must have unobstructed line of sight to use this. | |||||||||||
 Watch Xeno |
Allows the queen to watch over xenos as if they were cameras. You can also use Hive Status in the Alien tab (which can be bound as a Macro for ease of use.) or Ctrl + middle mouse click on a xeno (if you are already watching a another xeno) to choose who to watch. | |||||||||||
 Toggle Queen Zoom |
Allows you to toggle between zoomed out vision and the standard one.
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 Choose/Follow Xeno Leaders |
Allows you to appoint a Xeno leader to help with commanding and also follow them. Xeno leaders are automatically moved to the top of the Hive Status list.
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 Heal Xeno |
Heals a xeno.
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Gives plasma to a xeno.
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 Issue order |
Sends an order to the currently overwatched xenomorph that only they will be able to see. | |||||||||||
 De-Evolve Xeno |
Allows you to de-evolve a xeno to allow another to take its place. | |||||||||||
 Alien Tactical Map |
Brings up an alien minimap of the outpost/colony/prison for better tactical awareness.
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Attainable Mutators
Mobile Mutators
| Mutation |
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None |
Stationary Mutators
| Mutation |
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None |
Combat
The Queen can soak up an incredible number of hits. Unfortunately, she is slow and has a large hitbox. Marines may hit you around corners; any tile your sprite is on is a tile you can be injured from. The Queen needs to fight in cramped environments where the Marines can't focus fire on her, as in the open she will quickly be torn to shreds by Marines who can run faster than her - meaning all of them.
If you manage to somehow catch a marine, perhaps by cornering him or surprising him, you have the potential to drag him into an egg chamber for instant infection, or just shove him in a nest if he was trying to escape. The Queen's innate neurotoxin spit works best as the Queen's disarm timer is rather long. While the screech is a fantastic crowd control tool, it works best when you are accompanied by multiple xenos and capitalize on the mass stun. Therefore, you should warn the Hive of an impending screech, then charge in and do it once they're in position. This will stun every marine in its radius and turn an assault into a rout. Though, beware of over-enthusiastic xenos that block your retreat.
Pheromones
Pheromones scale based on what caste and upgrade tier is emitting them, aka an Elder Drone emitting pheromones will have a stronger pheromone effect than a Young Drone emitting them and as such the strongest will be used instead. If a Xeno is injured, use recovery. Also, use recovery to keep the pressure up if there's a skirmish. If there's a big push or fighting on grass, use Warding. Frenzy may be most useful during an attack, trying to contain escaped hosts, or moving around the map with high plasma. Note that same type pheromones do not stack, but varied ones do. e.g., Recovery and Warding.
| Pheromone: | Description: |
|---|---|
 Recovery |
Increases heath regeneration, plasma regeneration on weeds, reduces stun times of affected Xenos. |
 Warding |
Grants a reduction in armor taking damage, can also slow and even prevent crit bleedout for Xenos. Additionally provides a small health boost to critically wounded xenomorphs. Potent enough warding pheromones will completely negate bleed out and improve damage reduction to armor. |
 Frenzy |
Increases movement speed, tackle chance and damage from slashes. |
How to Lead
Remember that the aliens are a HIVEMIND. They are not "One Mind, Many Bodies." A Hivemind is a collective intelligence. As the Queen, you are actually the member of the Hive with the LEAST personality. You're a reflection of every other member of the Hive. That doesn't mean you shouldn't give orders, but it does mean you should listen to the other aliens. Ten heads think better than one - and they're your eyes and ears. Refusing to listen to other aliens is like putting a blindfold on.
It's important to remember that while the other castes have to do what the Queen says, they don't have to like it. They can bitch and moan and make a Queen's life a living hell by generally not giving it their all. As the Queen, you need to be... NICE. The aliens have to LIKE YOU. If they don't, a Queen is in for a bad time.
The number one rule of Queen has nothing to do with how you fight, or how you build your Hive. The number one rule of playing Queen is: BE POLITE!
As the Queen, you're a monarch, not a dictator. What's the difference? A monarch rules through worldly might, but also through charisma. Do you know what happens when a monarch is hated by the people she rules? The French Revolution, that's what. Now, obviously your children can't rebel in this game quite so drastically, but aliens who hate the Queen are demoralized, and their behavior is quite erratic. When you hate your commander's guts, you will, at least subconsciously, perform WORSE.
So how do you separate the good Queens from the bad ones? Well, here is a checklist of bad Queen behavior:
- The Queen insults the lower castes regularly or expresses contempt for the lower castes.
- The Queen insults sisters who die in battle.
- The Queen refuses to even acknowledge suggestions.
- The Queen orders any lower caste member who disagrees or criticizes them to cease talking.
- The Queen gives orders contradictory to the purpose of the caste (Ordering runners to play Hive guard, ordering drones to capture hosts).
- The Queen gives contradictory orders, or impossible orders, such as ordering the Aliens to only kill in defense of the Hive and then setting slashing to Not Allowed.
- The Queen refuses to allow the members of the Hive to hunt at all and keeps everyone inside even when a siege is not taking place.
- The Queen refuses any responsibility for failures.
- The Queen refuses to grow their ovipositor even if it's at the right time.
If a Queen somehow does everything on this list, tell an Admin via ahelp, because that's griefing. Nobody does all this on accident. Or if they do, then they need a stern talking to.
Taking Command Of the Bird
To take command of the Bird you'll want to click on the bird's console. Doing so will lock it down for the next 10 minutes, giving your hive plenty of time to board and redecorate. When you're ready to go to your new destination press the launch button on the console and the Bird will fly you away.
Sources and Reading
- Doctor Bright's Guide to Proper Queen Etiquette by Evilkyle24
- Advanced Xeno Strategy by Redrover1760