For some reason, the droplet invoker uses request.resolveName on line 311 to get the droplet to invoke, but the component is not stored in the request when running tests, so it generates a NullPointerExcepiton.
The solution is simple, just change line 311 to get the component from Nucleus, which is in the request.
eg: getRequest().getNucleus().resolveName(pDropletName) instead of getRequest().resolveName(pDropletName)
Fixed version of DropletInvoker.java with line 311 changed as described .
Note that the test where the NPE was occurring was a regular jUnit test and did not extend AtgDustCase, so there's a chance that this bug was due to the way that I implemented my test rather than a fundamental flaw in the DropletInvoker.