The Swarm
No one knows where the Swarm originated. Some believe it is an ancient weapon system that outlived its makers. Others call it a living ecosystem with no ceiling on appetite. All agree on one thing: where the Swarm arrives, the world ends.
Populations vanish. Structures are hollowed out and repurposed. Spores infect the soil. The sky changes color. Survivors report creature forms that didn't exist the week before, as if the Swarm is running experiments across entire biospheres. It isn't adapting to the planet. It's replacing it.
Diplomacy has been attempted. It failed. The Swarm does not and cannot listen.
Drone Pod
One claw rips. A thousand claws erase.
The Swarm doesn't strike all at once. It infiltrates first.
Drone Pods are the first wave: fast-growing, semi-autonomous creatures directed by hive-echoes from distant queens or nodes. They are not smart. They don't need to be. Some tear through armor. Others spread viral mold or excrete corrosive spores. All are expendable. They are not born to win battles. They are born to open the way.
Drone Pod is a horde squad for players who want to overwhelm through numbers and pressure. Your units are cheap and disposable, but the Brood Mother's Infest ability spawns free Swarmlings mid-mission, and Neural Command lets her direct multiple squadmates in a single activation. The more enemies you pin down, the harder you are to stop. Attrition is your weapon.
Hunter Killers
There is no outrunning what was bred to hunt.
Hunter Killers are apex spawn: larger, faster, and more deliberate than the masses that came before. They are the survivors of failed invasions, evolved in the ash of exterminated hives. Where Drone Pods flood and overwhelm, Hunter Killers target, isolate, and finish.
Each one is bred for a specific kind of brutality. Some burrow and ambush. Some stalk from range with acid and spine. All of them feed. They are few by Swarm standards, but they carry the full weight of the hive's intent distilled into something that doesn't stop until the target is gone.
Hunter Killers are a precision flanking squad for players who want control over a more aggressive, mobile playstyle. Small unit count, high individual threat. Acid Blood punishes enemies who trade into you, Venomous Bonespurs slow targets for follow-up attacks, and Pulseshriek repositions enemies on demand. Play the angles, isolate targets, and let the Hive's design do the work.