Spider drone

s are small robots which are employed by the Chinese Army.

These little robots are a sort-of mobile landmine for the Chinese army. Their primary method of attack is to approach enemy targets and explode. They are only encountered briefly during the Paving the Way quest and thus there is very little information to be gathered on them.

According to a Chinese terminal entry, the model encountered in the Anchorage Reclamation simulation is designated "Spider Drone MKVI Prototype", and they are air dropped via bomber.

A Chinese terminal entry advises their own soldiers to be careful around the drones even though they are configured to only attack Americans. Additionally, you will occasionally see a Chinese Soldier fighting one of these on the way to the Chimera Depot, suggesting that the prototypes might still suffer from problems with friend-or-foe recognition or might even lack it entirely.

Appearances
s appear only in Fallout 3's add-on Operation: Anchorage.

Trivia
s may be a reference to StarCraft, in which the Terran race may place a tiny drone called a "Spider Mine" which will run to and explode when an enemy comes near. They may also reference the Claws in Philip K. Dick's short story "Second Variety", filmed as "Screamers" and often credited as the inspiration for "The Terminator".

It is interesting to note that they look VERY similar to the Cryo Mine and Cryo Grenade that were cut from the final game. (We know what these explosives looked like because the meshes were still left in the data files.)