Breath of Fresh Air

[Micah]

Breath of Fresh Air requires you to reach 95% atmosphere in 50 turns or less for perfect. I'm not sure how that is possible. You can do 2% every few days via planetary mission, but that isn't going to get you to more than like 20% within the time limit, assuming you do it non-stop and it isn't always available.

I tried rushing science and teching up the terraforming line to get Carbonate Processors and their upgrade, but even outsourcing at every opportunity and building a pure science community I can't seem to reach that prior to about 35 sols in, which means I would have to instantly build about 11 upgraded carbonate processors as soon as I reach the necessary tech. This would require 2200 concrete available and the drones to transport it to quickly build them all. By 10 sols remaining I can squeeze out about 8 on my best attempt yet.

This is all ignoring atmosphere _loss_, preventing which requires Magnetic Field Generators (hundreds or the last tech which lets you do a planetary mission to reduce loss... for 30,000 science.

Is there some other way to get atmosphere up that I'm missing?

[Ericus1]

Melting the ice caps is a +10% boost the first time you do it, with a diminishing return. Two or three of those would net you a 20% increase or so.

[SkiRich]

Originally posted by Ericus1:

Melting the ice caps is a +10% boost the first time you do it, with a diminishing return. Two or three of those would net you a 20% increase or so.

Just be fore warned, melting the ice caps requires detonation of an atomic bomb over them.
This pretty much guarantees a dust storm late game when dust storms would normally never occur. If your good with that then blast away.

[Micah]

How do I get Melting the Ice Caps option? I was doing all of the planetary anomolies and don't remember seeing any that give an atmophere boost other than the +2% atmosphere, +1% heat one.

[Ericus1]

It's a late terraforming tech, nuclear terraforming.

[Micah]

{LINK REMOVED}https://snipboard.io/7rbmos.jpg the tooltip indicates that it is only for water. You are saying it is for atmosphere as well? I didn't research it because tooltip didn't indicate it would help...

[Ericus1]

20% water, 10% atmosphere on first use.

https://survivingmars.paradoxwikis.com/Expeditions

[Micah]

*grumble* I hate uninformative tooltips. Unfortunately, my oldest auto-save isn't far enough back to allow me to still win on that game, best I could do is 2 Sols over the limit.... which means to beat that level I'll need to start over from the beginning and do everything again.

[Ericus1]

While I'll agree that it's probably an oversight or mistake on that tooltip, I'm surprised you went straight for one of the challenges without ever just terraforming a regular colony. You probably would have known about the expedition and could have saved yourself the irritation of having to redo the challenge.

[cerabus2001]

Originally posted by SkiRich:

Just be fore warned, melting the ice caps requires detonation of an atomic bomb over them.
This pretty much guarantees a dust storm late game when dust storms would normally never occur. If your good with that then blast away.

RIP 146 poor souls in my last game. 3 Sols Dust Storm :(

[Micah]

I did terraform in a previous game, but I didn't pay close attention to what caused the melt the caps to become available nor did I remember what they did.

I assumed that for this challenge whatever the condition for melt the caps was, it just wasn't available. In the challenge for some reason. Also, I was hoping someone here would give me advdce like this in case I was wrong (which I was, and someone did!).

[arthurlewis]

Yes agree this is a really tough one. I have only managed silver so far despite having got gold on most other challenges. I had 6 fully upgraded carbonite processors last time and still missed gold!

[bongerman85]

if u got really lucky you could get the ancient terraforming device breakthrough, but only if ur lucky.

[Carlos]

For those potentialy looking for this in the future.

I just perfected this with 13 sols to spare (i.e. in 42 sols). It's not so bad. For your initial loadout don't take any probes or materials. Take at least 10 drones, at least 1 Refinery, 1 Drone Hub and 1 Transport. Send 20 more drones, 1 Explorer and 1 Commander with the 2nd rocket.

Land on the suggested spot, place your universal depot (this will get filled every day) and immediately place two of all specialized depos next to it and set the maximum desired amount on them (180). That way every time the universal depot is filled the resources will get siphoned out and it'll be empty and ready for the next day. Also start immediately gathering metals with your Transporter, you'll need a lot of them.

Build one Sensor Tower and start scanning. With the tower and 10x speed the scans are almost instant, that's why you don't need any probes.

Start mining those 4 or 5 concrete deposits ASAP and beeline the GHG factory and Carbonate Processor. Rush within reason, you don't have to sacrifice everything to the Terraforming research. I recommend getting the GHG factory before Sol 5 and the Processors before Sol 20. That way you'll need 10-15 GHGs and 10 Processors (as well as 2-ish Magnetic Field Generators), depending on how often you can do the "Import Greenhouse Gasses" special expedition and how soon you can reach the "Launch Space Mirror" tech.

You should also get the dome fairly quickly (before Sol 5), build one lab and import mostly Scientists. Put them on Hard Work and that should help you with your research, together with regular 1B outsourcing.

As for money, you'll get 30 rare metals every day so buy a 3rd rocket, set two of them to automatic delivery and you'll swim in cash soon. Use the 3rd rocket to import greenhouse gasses and for planetary anomalies. As for those, focus on the "Unlock Tech" and "Research Boost" ones, don't worry too much about Breakthroughs or the "event" ones, none of them are very useful on this map. You wanna unlock and research those GHGs and Processors fast.

Also don't bother with mining or producing anything, that endless depo should take care of all your needs. Just keep it empty every day and you'll be fine. Maybe you'll need to import a rocketload or two or Machine Parts when you have to build 10 Carbonate Processors at the same time but otherwise the endless depo is your friend.

As for getting to those lower levels on the map I recommend tunnels. Ramps just take too long and would consume a lot of waste rock which you'll need for your Processors. That's why you need the Commander, to build the second tunnel from the "valley" to the plateau on the opposite side.

Good luck!

[Sho Ya]

^^^Thanks for this @Carlos. Was coming close but struggling to make the gold deadline, then found this post and cruised through it in 40 sols! Appreciate the walkthrough!
Screenshot of all it took:
https://steamcommunity.com/id/shoya4000/screenshot/2019349572187460611/