Why did bomber drones get added to AH?
IIRC, drones were added when the bomb sight was made (more) realistic. After a short time passed, the complaints about the difficulty of the new bomb sight resulted in its elimination and a return to the old, simple sight (the more accurate sight still exists in AvA and some events), but the drones stayed.
Pretty much.
HTC intended for bombers to do more carpet bombing style runs where it takes several bombs dropped to insure a hit. The full manual calibration reduced bombing accuracy (and for some players prove entirely too difficult). As compensation, HTC tripled the player's ordnance by allowing drones - so he can pickle 3 times on one structure (say, a little short, on target and a little long as see through F6) and if just one of those hit, it will do the same damage as releasing 3 bombs with laser accuracy from a single bomber. In addition it increased the bomber defensive power (because bomber players are unable fly with wingmen it seems - how often do you see a pair of bomber formation? how often do you see two fighters in formation?) and gave the player "3 strikes" before being sent to the tower.
The manual method proved too difficult to the point-and-click crowd. It also seems that players psychology cannot accept "wasted" bombs and they got frustrated with the need to drop multiple bombs in order to kill something as soft as the dar tower. So, HTC went for a middle ground - players still need to calibrate, but the process is a simple "hold Y", takes only 3 seconds or so, and the accuracy is perfect. Laser accuracy was returned, bombs hardly ever miss again and a single *player* can now deliver tree times the amount of ordnance he could before - thus a single lanc formation can shut down a V-base or all FH on A-base from 25k, or kill HQ. It also takes 3 times the ammo of fighters to stop a single bomber player from reaching the target - Thus, two noobs in B17 will send me home with guns dry, while two noobs in fighters will die quicker, pose near zero threat to me and leave me with 80% of my ammo to shoot down more.
disclaimer:I am for keeping formations in AH and making them widely available!
My beef is with the absolute bombing accuracy, bomber formations that dive away at 450 mph while gunning, and the treatment of drones as disposable bomb-carts.