Guide and Tips (my way)

[Ultima]

Hi,

I'd like to share my experience of the game. Been playing 650+hours, and finished Phase 4 three times, as single player, including two times in ~95hours.
I've seen many people asking for help, in any subject: conveyer belts, pipelines, production line, optimization, energy, etc... So I'd like to help a bit by sharing my little knowledge !
Of course this thread is all personnal, it may not be the best way, and a lot of people are playing differently.

I assume you already played the game a bit, and know how to use your scanner to find ressource nodes, mine ressources with Portable Miner or building Miner MK1, craft manually with the Craft Bench, moving ressources using converyer belts, finding your first slugs, etc...

There will be a lot of spoil tho. I'll be explaining things about Tiers and Phases, map and mobs, tricks and tips.

Part I : First Tier, starting spot, first ressources

When you started the game you had to choose a spot. The game is actually a single giant map. Wherever you started, all spots are somewhere all over the map in different biomes.
So if you feel uncomfortable with your starting environement, you may just erase your HUB and craft somewhere else instead of starting a brand new game.
That been said, all starting spots have their pros and ♥♥♥♥ (enemies nearby, flat fields), but you will always have some Iron / Copper / Limestone near your position, letting you start nicely.

First things first, let's set this right now in case it's not clear enough: You need ressources for the recipes in order to craft advanced items (to clear the Phases), AND you need ressources for your personnal usage to craft items/buildings and the Tiers.

So be sure always to have a production just for you. Here are some advices.

Advice for iron items:
50 iron plate / minute
30 iron rod / minute
60 screw / minute
This require 120 iron ore / minute.
4 Smelters, 8 Constructors (3 for Iron plate, 3 for Iron rods, and 2 for Screw)

Advice for copper items:
60 wire
30 cable
30 copper sheet
This require 120 copper ore / minute.
4 Smelters, 8 Constructors (4 for wires, 1 for cable, and 3 for sheets)

And for Concrete:
40 concrete
This require 120 limestone / minute.
3 Constructors

It should be enough for the entire game.
Remember, we will use new nodes to craft other items.
Also, you should be creating those items using only 1 node: either a pure node, or Miner MK2 on normal node, or 2 slugs on Miner MK1 on normal node. So eventually adapt as the game goes on.

You may want to create more items, because maybe you don't want to wait 4~8 minutes to clear each Tier 1 and Tier 2 steps.
But let me be clear, if you exploit all your nodes, craft bunch of basic items, this will happen to you:
- You will create unoptimized production lines
- You will have a lack of nodes around you
-> So you will have to erase / adapt everything
-> Or worse to move in another place because you don't want to destroy everything
Eventually you will lose time, so I'd advice you to just do what is needed in the beginning.
If you have some free time, go cut more leaves, collect some berries around, kill some enemies, look at the awesome shop and the M.A.M research trees, or just craft some items manually.

Also let me set something else right here: how to use Slugs.
You certainly found some already, even just 4 or 5. Those little shiny slimes are juicy.
But how to use those the best way ?
I assume slugs are mainly made to increase the ressources extracted from Miners, and late game Buildings only. And you should never ever use slugs for Smelters, Constructors or even Assemblers.

There are a limited amount of nodes on the map, so you need to maximize them by using slugs on them. Using slugs on every nodes, regardless the quality, is always a good idea.
You could use slugs for Smelters or Constructors, but I highly recommand to NOT take this habbit.
Slugs should be used on Miners, and on advanced buildings only. Slugs are rare. You may find 300 slugs in 100hours and think it's a good amount.

But let me give you an example about late game production line:
When extracting 600 ores / minutes, you need 20 Smelters to produce the ingots, then 20+ Constructors to produce the basic items with those ingots. If you start putting slugs on smelters and constructors just to save some space, let's say to half the smelters, you need 20 slugs ; and another 20+ slugs for the constructors.
Putting 40+ slugs for this is definitly not worth the cost. Also this example leads you to craft 1 single item in the end, so you better think twice before using your precious slugs.
Smelters and Constructors don't take much place, and are cheap, so just create dozens of them. Keep your slugs for late game buildings, you can trust me on this.

Part II : Early energy, first exploration, moving faster between your bases

Let's talk about the energy. Biomass is only manual, forcing you to move to coal quickly.
You will feel pain cutting the grass every 15 minutes... So you should craft the Chainsaw right when you unlock it (Tier 2-2), and start transforming your basic biomass into Solid Biofuel for your Genrators.
With the chainsaw, only 1 or 2 minutes are needed to collect enough biomass for 1 or 2 hours.
Then use 2 Constructors, 1 for leaves 1 for wood, to produce Solid Biofuel. And create all your generators next to it, so you need less time to fill them.
You may also find some Mycelia while cutting some trees, if so keep them for later.

At this moment you should have finish Tier 2
Next step is to craft the Space Elevator and discovering the items needed to clear the Phase 1, giving you access to Tier 3 and Tier 4.

Items needed are Smart Plating x50.
Phase items cannot be crafted manualy on the Craft Bench. So just create an Assembler, and add manually what's needed to craft those 50 items. It's quite easy at this point, there is no need to make a real production line yet.
And so welcome to Tier 3 !

I would advice you to clear Tier 3-1 before thinking about anything else because it unlocks the Coal Generators, allowing you to get rid of the Biomass technology and start having permanent energy, using Coal.
You could craft the items required manually, but it would take a lot of time because you need items for the Tier step AND for the Coal factory.

So let's create a Rotor production, a Reinforced Iron Plate production, and a Modular Frame production first, all together:
Again, this is only for your personnal usage:
8 Rotor / minute
12.5 Reinforced Iron Plate / minute
1.67 Modular Frame / minute
This requires 90 iron ore / minute (if you have 120/minute save 30 for something else)
3 Smelters, 8 Constructors (1 for Iron plate, 4 for Iron rods, 3 for Screw), and 6 Assemblers
(2 for Rotors, 3 for Reinforced Iron Plate, 1 for Modular Frame)
Here we will voluntary unoptimize the production line, wasting some items in order to save a lot of time and pain (because the recipe asks for annoying numbers).

Details about the Reinforced plates:
1 Constructor to craft 20 Iron plates, then divide those by 3 with a splitter into 3 Assemblers
1 Constructor crafts 15 Iron rods, don't split and use 1 Constructor to craft 40 Screw, then divide by 3 into the 3 Assemblers with the iron plates.
Details about the Rotors:
2 Constructors crafts each 15 Iron rods, then divide each 15 rods by 2 with a splitter, one half into an Assembler, the other half into a Constructor crafting 40 Screw then into the Assembler.
Details about the Modular Frame:
1 Constructor crafts 15 Iron rods into an Assembler
On the 3 Assemblers that crafts Reinforced Iron Plate, take half of one (2.5) and put into the Assembler

Tip about Production rate (available after unlocking certain things in M.A.M slug tree):
Here your Modular frame production line isn't perfect because you only get 2.5 reinforced iron plate instead of 3. If you look at your Assembler, you may see somewhere the production rate (in the slug space), and you can actually modify the production rate anytime by clicking and typing.
Here, since you are underproducing items, I advice you modify the number to fit the reality. Just use calculator, type 2.5/3 and you will find 0.833333.
So, in the production rate, type 83.3333% (always 4 digits)
Why doing that ? Because instead of consuming variable amout of energy, by awaking and sleeping every couple of minutes, your machine will work permanently, giving you a better view of your energy power.
I advice you to ALWAYS do that when you underproduct. When using slugs it also works, 126.6666% for example, instead of 150%.

Tip here about Splitters:
When having a recipe such as the Rotors, which asks 4 Iron rods and 25 Screw: You may have 1 Constructor making 15 Rods, and then divide this number by 2 using a splitter.
You have 7.5 / 7.5 for a moment, but since the Assembler only needs 4 Rods to work, it will accumulate the rods, and then when the stack reaches the maximum inside the Assembler (200), any overflow item will go on the other side of the splitter, allowing you eventually to split the 15 Rods as 4 / 11.

You need ~12 minutes to get the items needed to clear Tier 3-1.

During this time, let me give you another tip about conveyer belts:
Some people like to always use the highest MK conveyer.
But, I would advice you to always use the "good" conveyer and not to oversize it.
First of all, high conveyers costs other ressources.
Second, having the good conveyer gives a landmark, you know what's going on just by looking.
And finally, having the good conveyers, especially MK 1 and MK 2, helps a lot splitting the ressources.
Everyone know how to split on 2, 3 and 4, also on 6, 8, 9 or 12.

But how do you split in 5 perfectly ? Well it's by using conveyers MK1 and MK2 the good way.
Use a splitter to divide any amount of ressources (max 300) by 3, using two conveyers MK2 and one conveyer MK1.
Since the speed of MK2 is exactly the double of MK1, you have:
40% of ressources on a conveyer MK2
40% of ressources on the other MK2
20% of ressources on MK1
So just use two other splitters on the conveyers MK2, and you have 20% on 5 ways, using 3 splitters in total.
And if you know how to divide by 5, you know how to divide by 10 or 15.

And how to divide by 7 ? Well this one is not perfect, but here it is:
Use a splitter to divide any amount of ressources (max 780) by 3, using two conveyers MK5 and one conveyer MK3.
Since the speed of MK5 is nearly the triple of MK3, you have:
~42% of ressources on a conveyer MK5
~42% of ressources on the other MK5
~16% of ressources on MK3
Use two other splitters on the conveyers MK5, and you have 14% on 6 ways, and 16% on 1 way.

Last tip about splitters: every splitter do overflow naturaly. When dividing by 7, the machine receiving 16% will eventually be full, and then the overflow will run throught the other splitters (e.g. Rotors).
So actually, you can divide by any number doing chaotic things, when your machines are full, the overflow goes to the next one. So it just takes time.
But it only works if the initial amount of ressources is equal or superior than what you need on your machines, else nothing can overflow.

Now, goignback to business. Immediatly use your scan to find Coal, and if you have more than 1 spot around, you should choose the one that has water near it, because the generators need water.

Coal energy is simple to manage:
600 MWh
This require 120 coal / minute, 8 Coal Generators, 3 Water Extractors.
I advice you to go to the coal location with all items already, so you can craft the factory in one time, and then go back to your base creating Power Poles on the way.
It's your first time using pipelines tho. You need to be aware that fluids do move in pipelines in stratght lines and can reach some small heights. So if you need to create a vertical pipeline, you need to add a pump, pulsating the water higher.
Pipeline junction cross are like splitters, the fluids do split evenly, and like splitters for converyer belts they transfer overflow where there is space. It means you can for example connect 8 coal generators together, then connect water from the water extractors to a single junction cross, and eventually each pipelines will be overflow until it becomes stable.

Now that you have some energy the nice things can start. With stable energy, you will be able to make your first deep exploration without thinking about your Biomass anymore.
The Tier 3-2 and 3-3 should take about half an hour for the Rotors to be crafted, so you should take your berries, your Object Scanner and your Rebar Gun with some ammos before leaving your base.
You really need to find some Caterium and Quartz. Look around everywhere, you might find some raw stones giving you just the amount of Caterium or Quartz needed to make the first research in the M.A.M tree, upgrading your scanner so you can locate Caterium and Quartz nodes.

When your scanner got its upgrades, you may create a small production of the new items discovered:
120 caterium ore into 180 Quickwire, using 3 Smelters and 3 Constructors
120 raw quartz ore into 75 Silica and 45 Quartz cristals, using 4 Constructors (alternate Silica and Quartz cristals, and the ressources will spread evenly. Remember the splitter tip I gave for Rotor recipe)
You definitely need to progress over the Quartz M.A.M tree to unlock and craft the Blade Runners, craft them as soon as you can and equip them.

Now, you should have enough items to clear Tier 3-2, 3-3 and maybe even 3-4.
Increase your damage potential by crafting the Xeno-Basher, and check your energy power.

If you followed the advices I gave you, you should be around 500 MWh usage and 600 MWh production. So you now just have enough energy left to create a Steel production for your personnal usage:
26.66 Steel pipes / minute
20 Steel beam / minute
This requires 120 coal and 120 iron ore / minute
3 Advanced Smelters, 4 Constructors (2 for Steel pipes, 2 for Steel beams)
At this moment you may have a problem with the ressource location, Iron ores somewhere and coal far from the spot. If so, you can either build a long conveyer belt, passing through the environment. Or you can try using the trucks/tractors: they are very convinient in terms of aesthetic, since you can build roads with fundations. Learning trucks is not mandatory at all, but if you want to experience every part of the game you should try.
Also, trucks do need energy to work, and they can use coal as energy, so it fits to use trucks to move coal.
You may experience an issue while using a truck to move the 120 coal / minute. Since the truck use some of the coal as fuel, you have only 110+ left or so. So you need a bit more. You can use another node to get a bit more coal, which is the bad idea because you need to avoid using too many nodes. So use a slug instead.

Remember, slugs are made mainly for nodes, because the more ressources you get from 1 node, the less nodes you need to exploit, saving some nodes for later stuff.

Now that your steel production is running, you can hang around and see your energy power level needs to be increased.
So you better double your coal generators, going from 600 MWh to 1200 MWh ! Fortunately, since you took time to make the steel factory, you again have enough items to create everything right now in one time.

And by the time you increased your energy, you now have enough Steel pipes to clear Tier 4-1, giving you Miner MK2 !
Never ever use Miner MK1 anymore. Again, ressources are rare, maximize them. If you had issues creating the previous production lines I mentionned because of the ressource amount, you may want to update your Miners for MK2 before doing anything new.

Last thing but not the least, by finishing Tier 4 you can now create hypertubes to travel faster between your bases / ressources spots. Try them !


(part 1)

[Ultima]

Part III : Optimization of basics, advanced items, finishing Phase 2

Nice job already, you have any items you need to build what you want, you have energy, and you run faster !

Now that Tier 4 is cleared, it's time for Phase 2 on the Space Elevator.
But before going on this, let's optimize a bit our base shall we ?

First: Be sure you extract the good amount of ressources on all your production lines, you now have Miner MK2, and maybe some slugs.
Second: You should unlock in the M.A.M the AI limiters item to craft Smart Splitters, which we can build to use the Awesome Sink more wisely, giving us more tickets for the awesome shop, and a better view of our energy power (what ?).

Let's use smart splitters.
Smart splitters do have 2 main jobs:
When mixing different items in a single conveyer belt, you can split precise items by managing the smart splitter.
And you also have a function called "Overflow" which is almost the same as classic splitters, but here the way will only be used if all others are not available, instead of letting items pass by and wait for the machine to be full.

Let me explain:
You are creating 50 Iron plate / minute and saving them in a container.
When the container is full, the production line stops.
But you can use a smart splitter, precisely just before the container, and set one of the way to overflow, into an Awesome sink.
That way, you are sinking any new items.
If you would put a standard splitter, you would only save half the ressources, and sink the other half.
Here with a smart splitter, you save ressources until your container(s) is/are full, and THEN you sink.

So, you should be placing a smart splitter on every production line, just before the container(s) at the end. That way you are sinking any items when your containers are full, giving you more tickets for the awesome shop !

I know what you think now: what's the point about energy power and smart splitters ?
Well, when you look at your energy power level, there are different lines.
Orange is your actually consumption
Grey/Black is your energy (should be almost the same without Biomass)
Blue is maximum consumption if all machines work at the same time

And a lot of players do only look at the orange and grey. They think "oh orange is below grey, so I'm good". No you are not. Blue line may scare you.
When your production lines are sleeping because the containers are full, the orange line decreases. At a moment, you will have many productions lines sleeping, putting your orange line very low.
But what happen if you need some items, and you just take 1 stack of Iron plates, 1 stack of concrete, 1 stack of cable, and 1 stack of quickwire at the same time ? The production lines awake and the orange line may increase by hundreds in a second, leading you to a crash.

So, by using smart splitters everywhere, your production lines will never ever sleep, and you will have real view of your energy power, anytime. The idea is to have the orange line reaching the blue line. Any non-optimized production may create gaps between orange and blue tho, but you got the idea.
(You may also use Power Storage for a temporary help. But remember Power Storage are just giving you some time to fix the real problem: the lack of energy)

When you have optimize your production lines, let's go back to the serious work.
As I said all along, items you are producing until now should be for you and only for you. Don't put conveyers to create other items with it.

So here is the first time you will create another production of those items, in order to craft advanced recipes, and the complexe recipe of the Phase 2 requirements.
You have unlocked new items, and we need to create production lines for them.
Motors and Encased Industrial Beams.
Also you may consider looking now at the Phase 2 items.
Smart Plating, Automated wiring, and Versatile Framework.
There are similarities between some of these items, so we may create a factory for all of these at the same time.
Yes it will be bigger than usual, but that's the way the game works.
Also if you create a different production line for every item single, you will waste a lot of ressources nodes.

So, where to start ? Since this is very long, I will not write every step of the production line. At this point I am sure you have the basics now and can find it alone !
Therefore, I can give you some hints about the amount of items you should create:
(Also, if at this point you have some alternative recipe from hardwares, you are blessed)
10 Motors / minute (personal use)
6 Encased industrial beams /minute (personal use)
5 Smart Splitting / minute
15 Automated wire / minute
10 Versatile Framework / minute
You may also need some more energy power, always pay attention.

Hint: After completing Phase 2 demand, you should keep producing the Phase items and save them infinitely (don't sink). You need them to craft the next items for the Phase 3.

While producing all the items required to finish the Phase 2, go explore deep again. Look for slugs, hardwares, and unlock new stuff in M.A.M tree.
About hardware, tip: put a marker on the map when you acheive to get one, it helps when going back on same places. You can erase the name of the marker, so it doesn't bother you when moving your cursor over the map.

Part IV : More complexity, and new energy

At this point, when creating new production lines, you may manage a personnal use + save some items for future crafts. So I'll give you raw numbers you may save, using some stacks when you need, and then connecting a part of it into another craft later.
Also I may give you some numbers I feel comfortable with, but you may optimize yourself when you reach certain checkpoints.

Congratulations, you unlocked Tier 5 and Tier 6 !
You should have all items needed to clear Tier 5-1 instantly, and unlocking a new ressource, oil.

And this is the next step, go scan for oil and find a spot anywhere
With oil you can craft Plastic and Rubber, new items.
Oil may be more far than coal from your base, also they will be needed for a lot of recipe (plastic will be mandatory very soon, and rubber for late game). So you should craft and save a lot (minimum 3 big container), right now.
When you need some for your personnal use, just go fetch some stacks. You will not need a lot for yourself.

Here are my advices again:
200 plastic / minute
200 rubber / minute
This requires 600 oil / minute.
You also have a new mecanic to manage, some crafts using fluids now also reject fluids.
You can't let those rejected fuel in your machines, or else it will stack and when the limit is reached the production line stops. It needs to be evacuated. Also, fluids cannot be sink, because you cannot connect a pipeline to the awesome sink.
Luckily the fluid rejected, here Heavy oil residue, can be transformed into Petroleum coke.
If you have water nearby I recommand using those as fuel for more coal generators, giving extra energy power if you have water nearby. Else you may sink them.

You can now clear Tier 5 entirely. Craft the Heavy Modular Frame manually for now. And for the Fabric items, you may find Mycelia by collecting mushrooms on ground in some biomes and caves, or by cutting some trees (especially the hugh mushrooms of course).

Leading you to Tier 6.
Before finishing Tier 6-1, giving you the new energy technology with oil (which will increadibly help), I recommand you to create the production of Heavy Modular Frame.
It's a big thing again, like the factory for Motors and other stuff, so you may think a bit before start.
Advice:
4+ Heavy modular frame / minute (personnal use)
Those items will become very common to craft buildings. And later in the game, you may need them also to craft some advanced items. But since this factory is a bit complexe, you may either only craft 4 for your personnal use, or 6 right now and save some already for later instead of having to create this factory a second time.

The time you took to create this factory, you should have enough items to craft ~200 computer manually in order to clear Tier 6-1. You can also use a raw Manufacturer temporary and put the items inside manually to craft the computers.
And when you have 200 computers, you may also have 100+ Heavy modular frame already, letting you finishig Tier 6-1 !

Oil energy is now available ! Coal was fine until now, but you need to update your technology.
And that's not just about energy here, you also unlocked new items, like circuit board, computers, AI limiter, and high-speed connectors (if not, do it with M.A.M tree) which we need to automize with a production line.
Since all those items need oil / copper / caterium / (iron), it's convinient to make a factory with all of them at once.
Also, if by any chance you have some alternative recipe, like Circuit board and Computers, you may save a lot of efforts.

So have a seat and look for another oil spot. Having water this time is a must, because we will use another recipe than the previous one to craft the plastic and rubber:
60 oil / minute to craft 30 Resine and 40 Fuel

Here on this new factory, you want:
7.5 Computer / minute
11.25 High speed connector / minute
10 AI limiter / minute
20 Circuit board / minute
20 Packaged fuel / minute
Computer, like Heavy modular frame, will become mandatory items for many buildings, and also for late game crafts. So try not to sink those, and save them infinitly.
And to craft the items, you need plastic and rubber as intermediate items, here crafted with resine.
I'll be honest, if you don't have alternative recipe at this point, you better search some hardwares and prey for Circuit board or Computer. Because to craft my requirement, you will need thousands of oil.
You could even increase Computer production to 10 then.

Let's finally talk about fuel energy. Every Fuel generator mainly requires 12 Fuel to work, giving 150 MWh.
You may easily build 40 Generators using my way, giving 6.000 MWh.
If you need more energy power very fast, you can create another factory using the same basics:
60 oil makes 40 fuel
Sink every resine
Build Fuel generators
For example: 600 oil makes 400 fuel, means 34 generators.
33 of those generators will work at 100% production rate, and you may reduce the 34th one to 33.3333% production rate (remember my tip with production rates and energy management)

Well well well, it seems you are done with Tier 5 and Tier 6 entirely now.
Don't forget to craft the JetPack and you will love to explore for now on. Take some Packaged fuel with you.
Phase 3 is on the way.

Part V : The calm before the Storm, and how to travel this storm

If you continued crafting the previous Phase items, you may have a bunch of ressources already ready.
- Versatile Framework should be okay, if you made the 10 / minutes and played 4 hours it's done.
- Modular Engine should be easy work too. If you made the 5 Smart plating / minute, you may just connect/transport your rubber and either make just a new Motor production line, or move 1000 Motors manually from your personnal use if you feel a bit lazy.
- Adaptative control unit is the toughest item here, but if you followed my advice, you have everything you need, just connect everything (or move items manually if you want, such as the Heavy modular frame or Computers)

Also remember again to keep crafting the Phase items endlessly, for Phase 4. If you moved items manualy, you will eventualy have to build a real production line.

Last thing for this part, let me introduce you the trains.
By far my favourite way to move ressources from a spot to another, I made hundreds of trains all over my games.
Like trucks/tractors, trains are not mandatory, you can still build conveyer belts like spaghetties everywhere.
But if you have some subtlety, you may prefer experience more things and create those major imrovement of transport.

Trains require a train station, platforms, a locomotive, and freight cars.
They hide a lot of secrets, there are many ways to use them:
Since the buildings are wide and tall, you may need to craft fundations (no need to stay on ground tho, put some fundatons in the air a little)
5x2 fundations is required for every building.
Start building a train station and 1 platform, in a far location, let's say where you craft your quartz for example.
Then craft another train station + 1 platform at your base.
Now build rails all over the way, connecting the two locations together.
Finally, make a locomotive and 1 car.
The whole thing is "one block" and it requires energy power to work, so connect one pole to a the station (also, the other station may give energy at its location when connected to a pole, it's very convinient).
You can interact with the platform and set if they "load" or "unload" ressources, so make your set up.

Tip: In order to connect your stations there are many ways.
- You can make a big loop, which is what people do the first time.
- You can make 1 single line rail (no loop, so half ressource cost), and make a tiny loop just around your station, so your locomotive can go back on the same rail.
- Or, you can add a second locomotive, one facing on one side, the other on the other side, the cars in the middle. That way, the train will use again a single line rail, and each locomotive will awake/sleep when it's their turn to drive.

Now enter in the locomotive, and open the locomotive menu. Edit the travel, add the station in the order you want, register, start auto-travel, and it's done !
(I love trains)

You can also have different trains using the same line rail (or part of a line rail, by connecting two different line rails), but you need to learn how to manage them, in order to have only 1 train on a rail at the same time (or else... ?!). There is a special building for this, the Signals. Put them where the line rails connect, and make your tests to understand how it works.

You can go inside the locomotive to travel faster yourself from a spot to another, or you can ride the train, then run - crouch - jump - JetPack to move even faster

Last thing, negative thing: since the train takes some time to load and unload, the converyer belts stop when it occurs. You may then have some small issues next to the platforms. So what you can do is to have a container next to each platform, so when the train loads/unloads, the conveyers stock the items in the container instead of blocking the conveyer. Also, if your goal is to move ressource at a precise rate, like crafting 120/minute and need to move 120/minute, since the train makes a pause when loading/unloading, you may have issues (like with trucks and coal): you can fix this using a better conveyer belt, so the time lost while the train stops is gained when ressources move faster before and after.

Congratulations again on finishing Phase 3.

(part 2)

[Ultima]

Part VI : Last tech, last tears

First of all, never look at top right of the screen, you may have heart attacks.
Previous Phase requirements were "okay" because you already saw some of them, there was always one you already crafted, so you may felt good about it.
But here, you know 0 of those 4 things, and you need thousands of them, which is frightening.

When it comes to clear Tier 7-1, you unlock one of the last ressources, Bauxite, giving you Aluminium.

Stop napping and go create your Aluminium factory right now !
You need a spot with Bauxite of course (2 normal nodes or 1 pure node would be great), Water, Coal, Quartz, and Copper.
(If you have the alternative recipe for Aluminium ingots with no Silica (quartz), you may prefer use it to save some efforts)
Advice for this factory:
120 Aluminium Plate (for furture crafts. Just take some stacks when needed)
rest Aluminium cases. You will need a lot of those for furture crafts, save endlessly.
Also prepare 60 copper sheets for later (with Aluminium plate)

Tip here: again you will have fluids rejected, here Water. You may create a loop with water needed and water rejected, by calculating the exact water amount you need. Calculate accordingly, you need some Water extractors at first, and then to remove some (or modify production rate manually).
You may also experience an issue where the production line always overflow because of water, even when having the perfect numbers (even after realizing you forgot to use the pipelines MK2 instead of MK1). There is a bug right now with this, and to prevent experiencing that, you can just add in your pipelines full of water, a big container 2400L, it will absorb the buggy overflow of water.

Talking about Aluminium cases, let's make a Radio control Unit production line.

Yes now we go ahead, no time to waste.
But oh well, you need computers for this. So let's first create a new production line of computers using oil, crafting like 2.5 Computers / minute. And if you searched the Turbo items in the M.A.M, you may try craft Black Powder and Smokeless powder to craft Turbo fuel in the meantime.
Turbo fuel is the best fuel, it has a bit less capacity than Packaged fuel, but you will fly way higher. Try Turbo ammo too, very efficent against new big hogs.
You can also add some Fuel generators if you have some free fuel left.

Now that you have the computers are done, you also need Crystal oscillators, so you better create a production line, using Iron, Copper, and Quartz.
3 Crystal Oscillator / minutes is a decent number

Once you have those, transport Computers and Quartz Oscillators to the Aluminium cases spot, and craft the Radio control unit ! Depending on your previous work, you may craft 3~5 items per minute.

Excellent, Tier 7 is now finished !
And so my guide, because the Tier 8 is just a harder thing than last Tiers. Use all your knowledge to continue.

Advice for production lines:
3.75 Supercalculator / minute
2 Fused modular frame per minute
7 Cooling system / minute
1 Turbo motor / minute (using 4 of the Cooling system)
20 Battery / minute
4 Electronic magnetic rod / minute

You eventually unlock the last buildings.

Ressource Well Pressurizer, with its own extractors (you can only build those by connecting the Pressurizer to energy). This will give you huge amount of fluids on nodes. So you may build a new production line for Fuel energy power (with resine recipe, and sink resine)

And Particle Accelerator, which consum energy differently. Interact with it and watch carefully energy cost (also remember using slugs increase the energy cost ridiculously, especially here)

Last thing, remember the splitter 5 ways, it will be very usefull. Because 600 ores for 600 ingots now means 20 Smelters, so 4 times 5 splits.

If you followed my requirements, you may craft the Phase 4 items like this:
~4 Assembly Director System / minute
~4 Magnetic Field Generator
~1 Thermal Propulsion Rocket
~1 Nuclear Pasta
Start building the production line of the Assembly Director System, it's the toughest one.
Then Thermal Propulsion Rockets, a bit less tough
Then Nuclear Pasta, easy to build but long time to craft the 1000 items
Finally the Magnetic Field Generator, very easy craft here.

You don't need to experience building Nuclear factory to end Phase 4, but don't hesitate to take a look at it !
15.000 MWh ~ 20.000 MWh are way enough to beat the Phase 4.
Nuclear factory, depending on your wishes, may be bigger than the entire Phase 4 factories. Not because it needs a lot of ressources in terms of quantity, but because of the diversity: you need every ressources to build Nuclear energy. And if like me you want to enjoy building 30 Nuclear Plants for example, giving 112.500 MWh just for fun, you will need all different ressources AND huge amount.
So keep that for later.
Also take a look at crazy screenshots of other players buidling Nuclear plants ! 30 is very low compared to what other people did.

After hours of patience, you will eventually beat the Phase 4 !
This is all about being rigorous. There are enough ressources all over the map (especially by using slugs), you can take your time to build / craft everything step by step.
And eventually, you can only finish the game.



Thanks for reading.
I hope this thread helped a bit. I know it's long but I don't know I've just play some hours recently so I am very happy to talk about the game.

Enjoy playing, enjoy FICSIT, enjoy Cofee.

(part 3, last)

[Jack-o-Lantern]

Wow

[Gecko-[GER]]

Senseless in the forum. Why don't u create a guide?

[Ultima]

Originally posted by Gecko-GER:

Senseless in the forum. Why don't u create a guide?

I don't really know where to post a guide, not used to that. I just wanted to talk about the game somewhere

Edit: I never saw there is a "Guide" tab on steam games ... I guess we learn everyday. I'll create a guide there then. Thanks

[Gecko-[GER]]

Every game on steam has a hub where u can find everything related to it.

[Bohemian Rap City]

Hey, I love the help and saved it as a bookmark. Gave some points cuz the people ragging on ya!