How to build on the moon?

[ap]

Hey guys.

Very new to the game. Launched my first hab in low orbit around earth, and just realized some factions have actual bases on the moon lmao.

How do I build a base on the moon? When I click on the moon, I get two opitons: orbit, and found platform. But found platform sounds like a low orbit hab, and not something that's built on the actual land mass.

Thanks!

[tserleg1471]

I also made the same mistakes in the past. XD:

- First of all, skip your orbitals in Earth until you get some mines in Mars. Yeah, it is counterintuitive because in real life we have many satellites in Earth orbit, and we'll still need a lot of time to mine Mars. But boost is expensive in Terra Invicta, so you need mines to make satellites cheap.

- In the moon put a single 'platform' to create a mine. When you create an orbit, you choose the orbit and it can be low; to put something in the surface you need a platform. Instead to choose the 'best', choose the one with a higher diversity of resources, because you only want that single mine to make cheaper your mines in Mars.

- Mars. The winner of the space race is the guy who get here some mines. The probe and platforms will cost boost, but the mines can be paid in space resources once your Moon mine starts to work. In fact, it is usual to sell your Moon mine once you get some mines in Mars, because the last are better and the first one was only to make them cheaper.

- Once you have mines in Mars, then it is when you can afford orbitals in Earth for extra science and the space port. Maybe later another one in Moon to put there another space port.

[POWER WITHIN USER]

I think there's a faction research project for Outposts (the land based counterpart to platforms). No, you don't need a station around a body to be able to build an outpost though late game you'll have to use ships to start bases, along other things as you can't send building crews from Earth all the way to Jupiter and beyond.

You'll need Boost, the rocket resource, to build a lunar base along other things such as solar panels and a mine though the moon's resource income is rather limited specially when compared to Mars.

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by POWER WITHIN USER:

I think there's a faction research project for Outposts (the land based counterpart to platforms).

Yes, it's called Outpost Core.

[Ericus1]

Originally posted by ap:

Hey guys.

Very new to the game. Launched my first hab in low orbit around earth, and just realized some factions have actual bases on the moon lmao.

How do I build a base on the moon? When I click on the moon, I get two opitons: orbit, and found platform. But found platform sounds like a low orbit hab, and not something that's built on the actual land mass.

Thanks!

Did you ever send a probe to Luna? Regardless of anything else, you cannot build ground habs until you have prospected the solar body. Provided you have the tech, you can always build space habs.

[ap]

Thanks everyone for the tips!

I was missing sending the probe first hah. Started a new game with these new tips and having a much better time, thanks again yall

[gimmethegepgun]

Also, technically, you don't need to send a probe, because you can also copy survey data from other factions by Turning one of their councilors. It's best not to rely on this though.

[ap]

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

Also, technically, you don't need to send a probe, because you can also copy survey data from other factions by Turning one of their councilors. It's best not to rely on this though.

The fact this even exists is so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ cool

[Ericus1]

As some advice, you really want to have your pick of the single best site on Luna, and that means you want to be the first to probe it (the same is true generally for Mars). Each faction gains a bonus to their probe speed based on how much they contributed to the associated "Mission to X" tech, so if you want to win the "space race" to Luna/Mars, you want to make sure you are sending a probe the moment the tech is done AND that you contributed more than any other faction to the global tech while it was being researched.