Unlucky at picking a good start location

[--JR--]

So I managed to start at a location with no metal deposits near by. What can I do besides importing metal all the time and then running out of funds? Or is it time to start a new map?

https://i.imgur.com/3wZQ7af.jpg

[13Seven]

you can get rocks on the surface there also metals the rover and bots can get it for you
bad luck i had lots of mine and only 2water spots on my first easy playtrough

[--JR--]

Sadly I picked most of the rocks already...

[Minoris]

Never be afraid to restart if you're not having fun. Never!

That said, maps aren't random. From what I've seen/experienced, resource spots depend on the sponsor you select and then randomly selects one of two patterns for that specific sponsor. Moreover, the only way to force the game to change the pattern it selected for a map is to quit the game entirely and launch it again. (It may obviously select the same pattern again, but you get the idea.)

Knowing that, you can select a map that you like, choose the sponsor that you want, and then fill your first rocket with scanning probes (so 50 or 70 probes, depending on your sponsor). All you then need to do is scan half of the map (there are 100 squares), hit the "Restart Map" button, and scan the other half. You now know what the map you want to play on will look like and can plan accordingly, eventually even restarting several times to land on the desired square. (You'll have to go back to the main menu and start a new game from scratch to do this, simply selecting "Restart Map" will always land you on the same starting square. And even then, the amount of possible starting squares is limited and not entirely random so you may not even be able to land exactly where you'd want to.)

If you like being surprised and love to have to make do with what you get, obviously that trick takes that away. It's also kind of a cheat, honestly, but oh well.

[Apollo Creed]

well if your carnt get enough metal from earch or scavanging its gg, start of game is really inportant, done an in depth giude of how to get a good start everytime. hope that helps

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLyCqQPicro

[L37]

One way to deal with this is setting up "new colony" on one of that metal spots. Just land a rocket there with needed things, buid a dome and start mining. Then setup shuttles if you have the tech or use rc transporter to exchange resources.

[b0nehead]

Get a dome between normal and rare metals. You're golden.

[Minoris]

Originally posted by Wanted514:

Get a dome between normal and rare metals. You're golden.

If you mean on the bottom-left side of the screenshot, a dome between both of those resources will net you a big fat 0 income of either. If you owned the game, you'd know extractors need to be quite close to a dome in order to be staffed.

Edit: actually, the very same applies to the upper-right resource spot...

[b0nehead]

Originally posted by Minoris:

Originally posted by Wanted514:

Get a dome between normal and rare metals. You're golden.

If you mean on the bottom-left side of the screenshot, a dome between both of those resources will net you a big fat 0 income of either. If you owned the game, you'd know extractors need to be quite close to a dome in order to be staffed.

Edit: actually, the very same applies to the upper-right resource spot...

Oh i didnt even look at the pic im just speaking in general. I do own the game.

[--JR--]

Originally posted by L37:

One way to deal with this is setting up "new colony" on one of that metal spots. Just land a rocket there with needed things, buid a dome and start mining. Then setup shuttles if you have the tech or use rc transporter to exchange resources.

Think I will give this a try, probably my only option at this point...

[rightfn]

If you cannot setup a dome to mine metals soon, you can always buy metals from eartth. Be warned this is inefficient but you do need metals to survive, so...

Setting up a far-away dome is unfortunately a weak link in the game mechanics right now. There are plenty of threads on this already so I won't go into it here.