[English/JP] Introductory guide for Cryptark [日本語ガイド]

Everything helpful for beginners is here!
Covering game's basic, detailing each game mode, useful tips, enemies, playable suits.

I've beaten the campaign mode and collected 18 of 27 artifacts so far.
Feel free to leave your comments below, I'm still adding details so your knowledge is always welcome.
I hope my guide helps your salvage operation.

(Japanese translation below)
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ゲームの基本から各種モードの解説、敵や自スーツ等初心者に役立つ情報を載せたガイドです。
ガイド作成者はキャンペーンモードをクリア、全27個中18個のアーティファクトを入手しました。
日本語訳はずーっと下の方に追記中です。

Introduction

About the game

Game's objective : destruction of all the Core systems

The game consists of a series of randomly generated ships (level), regardless of what type of game mode you choose.
Most ships have only one core, which is your primary target to destroy in order to finish a level.


A ship can have more than 1 core system!
Cryptark the final ship always has 2 core systems, you need to destroy all of them in order to finish the level.

The Core systems are heavily guarded by other systems.

This gigantic brain thingie is "Central Core system", annihilating all of which shuts down all other systems and drones around the ship so that salvage workers can work safely and you can move to next level (ship)...but the game isn't simple.

Each ship has multiple systems other than core, Shield system protects another system with impenetrable barrier, if one protects the core then you have to destroy it before you deal with the core.
Not only the Shield system but also at least 1 Alarm system protects the core, which raises alarm to draw all the defense drones' attention to the protected system when it's in danger.

Everything is up to you.

Here's the fun part of this game: you can move freely following your plan.
The only systems you need to mess with are the Core systems and other systems protecting them, everything else is up to you.
Do you destroy Alarm system or not?
What about Drone Factory systems each of which spawns 1 defense drone for every 5 seconds, or Repair systems which literally repair 1 each of destroyed system?

Look around, look further.

You can see what lies ahead via moving camera further from you by pressing a certain key.
Check your key configuration in the option menu, and use this feature for your survival.
Your rate of survival surges by knowing what lies ahead.

Supply Pods: for ammo and repair

Supply Pods are randomly placed inside each ship, 2 types of which are available.
Both cost a hefty fee to use on campaign mode.

• Ammo Supply Pod: it fully refills your consumed ammo, don't appear on rogue mode.
  
• Repair Supply Pod: it fully restores your damaged hull.

Key Terminals: for unlocking doors

With Door-lock systems, some doors become locked thus prevent you from entering inside.
There's no need to panic or necessarily destroy all the Door-lock systems, instead simply look for this Key Terminal first, each contains a consumable key to unlock a door.
Prioritize which door to unlock and refrain from acquiring unnecessary keys.

Each key is one-time use only, 1 key for 1 locked door.

Tech Terminals: for more weapons and items

While the game features a massive ammount of weapons and items, at the start of every playthrough player have only access to the chosen suit's default equipments.
Others can be acquired from Tech Terminals during salvage missions.
Each terminal contains 1 either of weapon or item.

Bullet-time: Cling to your life!

When your hull gauge is completely depleted, the bullet time feature is activated and everything in the game slows down.
While the bullet-time doesn't last long, it gives you an enough time to get out of the trouble.

Artifacts: for unlocking other suits

This game features various playable suits, on the default state only 1 suit is playable, others require 2 artifacts each to be unlocked.
Artifacts can be acquired on both of campaign mode and rogue mode.

On campaign mode every artifact is a reward for completing a unique challenge, which requires you to successfully salvage a ship with an artifact under certain requirement.

Some artifacts on campaign are quite hard to acquire, so I'd recommend playing several games with the default suit to get the knack first.


On rogue mode artifacts are contained in an artifact pod which can be opened without a key from key terminals.
Achievement page tells which level to search for these artifacts.

Basic playing tips

Map screen: a source of useful info

On map screen in-game time is paused, there's no need to hurry.
Each square is an immobile turret controled by Sentry systems and each circle a mobile drone that spawns from Drone Factory systems.

This screenshot on the right shows you don't need to mess with turrets (red squares) as their line of fire is blocked by wall (green) so that you can focus the core and systems protecting it without dealing with sentry systems.

Evaluate necessary targets and pick easy ones first.

When the ship has multiple systems of the same type, you have to destroy all of them to shut down the corresponding threats under control of them.
If there're 3 Sentry systems on board, then there'll be no big difference until all the 3 systems are destroyed, which requires quite an effort and time.
Turrets are immobile and only covers limited area thus Sentry systems' priority is lower than drone factory systems.
If you're sure you can ignore Sentry systems, do so.

There's no need to destroy every system and enemy to beat a ship.
Avoid unnecessary risks, that's the best way.

Always carry some repair items.

Fix-5 or 10 is ideal, prepare for the worst situation!

Fight or hide?

Drones detect you by not only seeing you but also hearing your gunfire.
They can't see you through walls but can hear your gunfire.
Hushpuppy doesn't make them alert thanks to its sound suppressor.

Avoid unnecessary fight as enemies drop nothing useful or valuable, but don't be hesitent to fight when you have to.
On early levels, it's quite easy and wise to remain undetected so that ammo and energy are saved, which is crucial on rogue mode.
On latter levels, destroy everything you meet or you'll regret, I'm serious!

Enemies whose marker is white are active.
They try to hunt you until you move further enough to make them lose your trail.

Shoot from afar for your safety.

Whatever you're going to fight, don't let them get close.
Enemies don't react unless your presence is within their respective attack ranges.
This tactic works trully well against anything you don't want to fight nearby, such as level 3 core or Juggernauts or Sawblades or Slimers.

Assess and prioritize threats.

Dealing with a whole pack of enemies at a time will likely be a common cause of your deaths.
Try to exploit the difference of their characteristics like moving speed.

Turrets are immobile and can be easily neutralized by taking cover behind a wall.
Heavy Sentinels and Juggernauts move quite slowly, it's not difficult to outrun them alone.
First approach and run from a group of enemies quickly so that fast drones (Jackal and Spike) split from slow ones (Bomber and Heavy Sentinel) and immobile turrets.
Fight mobile drones first, leave immobile turrets later.
This greatly reduces the risk you face.

Don't be afraid of raising alarm, it's not a game ender.

Attacking a system under an Alarm system's watch or touching a Trip-Laser simply draws the attention of all the drones across the ship towards where the alarm is raised, not your location.
Drones can't detect you through walls unless you pull trigger.

Check the map, find a safe spot and hide there or get out of the ship and find another entry.
Alarm soon goes off and all the drones return to their former position.

Energy weapons: Which do you pick?

Each playable suit can't equip more than 1 energy weapon simultaneously.

Campaign mode

Victory condition: destruction of Cryptark's core
Losing condition: running out of fund, not your death

The game continues as long as your fund is in surplus at the end of every operation.

Tips for campaign mode

• On early missions reduce your hull and ammo ammount to minimum to maximize revenue.
  
• Try to acquire every tech before destroy the core.
  
• Ignore difficult secondary objectives or ships with a combination of terrible systems.
  
• Increase your initial ammo ammount instead of using Ammo Supply pods, which costs less.
  
• Bring lots of repair items instead of using Hull Repair pods, which costs cheaper.

On campaign mode, for every salvage mission you pick a ship to actually salvage from a cluster of 4.
Each ship's layout, set of systems and drones are completely random, there's no same one.
Once a salvage operation ends, you're given another cluster of 4 ships regardless of the result of previous operation.
You repeat this cycle until you successfully salvage 6 ships to locate Cryptark and destroy its core, or your finance becomes red.

Cryptark: your final target

Once you locate Cryptark, all other ships become unavailable.

• Cryptark has 2 core systems on board.
  
• Cryptark has no Tech Terminal inside.
  
• Cryptark's salvage operation has no secondary objectives except artifacts.
  
• You can try Cryptark as many times as your fund allows.
  
• Cryptark's layout doesn't change during the campaign.

Your death isn't the end of campaign, running out of money is.

Every campaign starts with a bank account of $500k.
For every successful operation you receive payment and ship's difficulty increases, try to maximize profit and minimize expenditure as possible, especially at the early part.

Every failed mission costs you $100k as failure fee.
Your client demands a compensation for your failure!
$100k aren't cheap, but don't give up!

Tech Terminals for additional equipments

Remember to interact Tech Terminals to recover alien technology, for each of which Contractor grants a randomly chosen license of weapons or items.
Try to recover as many as possible, more arsenals are always welcome.

Supply pods: They're not free!

Ammo Supply pods and Hull Repair pods cost you a hefty fee for use.
Bring more ammo and repair items instead so that you can reduce expenditure.

Ship's info screen

Name	Description
Difficulty	Indication for how hard this ship's salvage is, the higher the tougher.
Class	On campaign mode, ships are categorized into a variety of types, each class has a different set of systems and drones.
Reward	Bonus for achieving ship's main objective aka destroying ship's core.
Goal Time	Contractor has a tight schedule thus sets a certain time limit for every salvaging based on the ship's difficulty, exceeding which costs you as penalty for delaying client's schedule but salvaging faster rewards you. The amount of bonus or penalty is proportional to the amount of time you saved or exceeded.
Bonus	Every ship except Cryptark has 3 side-objectives, for each of which Contractor rewards you. They're even so generous to pay extra reward for completing all the three!
Artifact	Some ships contain an artifact, which is a token for achieving main objective under certain requirement, mostly tougher than side-objectives. Every artifact gives lore about aliens and can be consumed to unlock additional suit.
System scan	Indication of the number and type of deployed systems inside the target ship.
AI scan	Indication of the type of deployed defense drones, turrets, other objects inside the target ship.
Tech Advamces	Indication of how many tech terminals are inside the target ship. Each terminal contains an alien technology for each of which Contractor grants you a license of randomly chosen weapons or items. Cryptark has no Tech Terminals.
Health Stations	Indication of how many hull-replenishing pods are inside the target ship. Each pod fully replenishes your hull only once for money.
Ammo Stations	Indication of how many ammo-replenishing pods are inside the target ship. Each pod fully replenishes your ammo only once for money.

Rogue mode

Victory condition: destruction of Cryptark's core
Losing condition: your death

Differences from campaign mode

• Rogue mode has no time limit or financial management.
  
• Hull Repair pods are free for use, Ammo Supply pods don't appear.
  
• Defeating a ship doesn't replenish used ammo, used items, energy weapon's battery, nor restore damaged hull.

Tips for rogue mode

• Every weapon is expendable, swap them frequently, don't stick to nearly empty ones.
  
• Take your time and wait Energy weapon's charge before fully destoy the core.
  
• Time is on your side once you take out every repair and factory system, shuffle system becomes a mere annoyance then.

Utilize everything you stumble upon!

All the weapons and items are acquired from pods scattered through each ship, each of which contains a randomly chosen and real one not a mere license.
The type of its content is displayed on map, so you can see it's a machinegun but the exact name is hidden until you actually interact the pod.
You can choose to equip the content or leave it, swapped weapons or unused items remain inside the pod thus you can come back later to retrieve.

There's no ammo supply!

If you run out of ammo, you need to swap empty weapons with newly acquired one thus you'll be forced to utilize everything, including those you don't like or you're not good at using.

Rogue mode is more luck-dependent than campaign mode, so I'd recommend playing campaign where you can test every weapon freely.

Suit upgrades aka passive items, don't miss them.

On rogue mode, newly acquired passive items don't require an item slot!
Ignore those unworthy bothering with.

• Hazard Coating: Slimers are now your allies.

Ship's systems, part 1.

Part 1 introduces systems with higher threat, most of which will likely be destroyed.
Some systems have a level of its strength indicated by a number, the higher the tougher.

Central Core system

Your final objective for every ship, destroy it and you beat the ship.
Brain like thingie consists of 6 destructable parts, all of which have to be destroyed to shut it down, unfortunately some parts become darkened indicating they're invulnerable to your attack until all the light-colored ones are destroyed.

Failsafe system

Each failsafe system turns itself to the last destroyed system, which restrains your plan terribly.
Who wants another repair or Juggernaut factory!?

Possible candidates:

• Door-Lock system: It's the best candidate, as it literally does no harm.
  
• Nuclear Destruct system: I'm not joking, with a proper plan, explosion isn't that difficult to avoid.

Repair system

Each repair system not only restores the last destroyed system slowly but also reacts to player's attack by launching a pack of Hornet drones, which makes it literally a hornet's nest.
You need to hit exactly a small purple orb to inflict damage on the system.

On early versions, repair system used to heal itself slowly...now it doesn't, yay!

Repair process can be interrupted by destroying another system before finishing the process.
Repair system's attention is always toward the last destroyed system thus destroying other systems in succession before the current repair process is finished literally makes repair system unable to finish its repair process.
This is a big advantage.

Ships with higher difficulty likely have 2 Repair systems!
This forces you to move quickly, eventually leads to your doom.
Nuke weapons or remote nuke or teleport beacon will be your saviors.

• Flamer
  
• Minigun
  
• Nuclear Cell: It's quite situational and luck dependent.
  
• EMP

Related artifact (achievement):
Processed Ore (Appears in +4 level ships. Keep Repair system.)

Shield system

Each shield system protects 1 other system with an impenetrable barrier, a shield system protected by another isn't a rare sight on latter levels.
The shield system itself is protected by a rotary shield that blocks most of your attacks and deflect some of them, deflected shots can hurt you.
The rotary shield has 2 vulnerable gaps, through which you need to hit a purple orb precisely to damage the system.

Shield systems aren't that dangerous as they have no active attack measure, you can't be hurt unless you mindlessly touch or attack the rotary shield, they simply force you to spend your time.
The rotary shield's rotation speed scales with the number of system's level, the higher the faster.

• Lightning Spindle: it can bypass rotary shield.
  
• Laser vulcan:
  
• Other energy weapons: they can be blocked but can't be deflected, this makes them safer choices.
  
• Deployable turret: It doesn't target systems but its shot can be deflected, be careful.
  
• Shotgun weapons: Carefully timed point-blank shots easily destroy the system, be cautious.
  
• Machinegun weapons: Burst type requires an extreme caution.

Never use melee weapons against Shield systems, which simply damages you!

Alarm system

Each alarm system protects 1 other system and raises alarm across the ship when the protected system is in danger, which makes all the drones across the ship rush toward the protected system.

• Saw Arm: It damages the system bypassing its outer shells.
  
• Flamer: Fire damages the system through the outer shell.
  
• Explosives: its blast ignores the system's outer shell.
  
• Any shields: They block the annoying alarm laser.

Sentry system

Sentry system's laser can hurt other enemies.
It's powerful enough to even melt a Juggernaut like butter!

Drone Factory system

For every drone factory system, 1 randomly chosen drone appears somewhere across the ship with a bright blue light every 5 seconds.
You can see a roster of possible drones by hovering mouse cursor over each Drone Factory system on map screen.
While there's no telling where the new drone is spawned, it tends to be near a system, especially the core.

Juggernaut Factory system

Each Juggernaut factory system spawns a Juggernaut every 100 seconds.
The level of Juggernaut factory determines the weapon of the spawned Juggernaut.


Left: level 1, Right: level 2

Related artifacts (achievement):
Scarred Armour Plate (Appears in Hazard-class ships level 3+. Kill 5 Juggernauts.)

Shuffle system

This system literally shuffles the placement of all the systems across the ship every 60 seconds.
Fortunately the 1st shuffle takes longer.
While it's quite annoying on campaign mode, its threat level becomes lower on rogue mode once all the Factory systems are destroyed.

You must hit a purple ball in order to damage the system, which randomly spawns in one of 9 squares at short intervals.

Sensor Jammer system

Sensor Jammer system hides the layout of the ship and disables you to set a waypoint.
While you're not completely blind as the placement of systems, tech terminals, pods, flak turrets are revealed, being unable to check the type and placement of drones and turrets and entry points terribly hinders your early planning and raises the difficulty.


You'll be forced to wander the exterior of the ship aimlessly searching for entry points, making yourself an easy target for flak turrets, and inside face unexpected attacks from drones, turrets and accidentally trigger deployed mines or cage generators.

Hidden map can be revealed by moving through the ship.
As you reveal the map, the jammer system's threat level lowers.
You might end up successfully finishing an operation with the jammer active, which is fine and you should be proud.

Ship's systems, part 2.

These systems have lower threat compared to those on part 1, thus will be your secondary targets.

Armouring system

For each armouring system, every drone receives additional health of 25%.
While it's annoying, its threat priority is relatively lower should your weapons have enough fire power and abundant ammo.
It's wise to prioritize destroying drone factory systems first, more armoured drones consume more ammo.

Flak Control system

As the name says it keeps flak turrets on the exterior of the ship operational.
There's no need to bother with it as long as your safety is ensured.

Hazard system

click to enlarge.

Nuclear Destruct system

When a system is destroyed, the system causes a nuclear explosion as long as at least 1 nuclear destruct system is functional.
Nuclear explosions spread through walls.

Nuclear explosion can be your advantage as long as escape is secured.
The explosion damages everything inside it including Juggernauts and other systems, except those protected by shield system.




(Click to enlarge)

Door Lock system

The most harmless system of all, door-lock system turns some doors to locked ones.
Mostly you don't need to bother with it, thanks to Key Terminals.

The system itself is protected by 3 indestructible shutters, each of which requires you to enter a a certain series of commands using 4 keys. (up, left, down, right)
For each series of successfully entered commands, one shutter is opened, you need to do this process 3 times to reveal the system.

One wrong command closes all the opened shutters hurting you!
Failure doesn't change the required commands, take your time.

Drones from Factory system

Each drone factory system spawns one of these except Tattletale every 5 seconds.

Each drone is under control of the central core system, not factory systems!

Spikedog

• Shotgun weapons: Normal one suffices, a well-aimed shot easily destroys a Spikedog provided there's no Armouring system.
  
• Shield: Raise it to block Spikedog's ram and shoot with other weapons.
  
• Saw Arm: It damages and pushes away Spikedogs.

Jackal

• Shotgun weapons: Normal one suffices, it damages and pushes away Jackals.
  
• Shields: Combine with avoid maneuver.
  
• Saw Arm: It damages Jackals and blocks their shots.

Bomber

Sawblade

Sawblade is literally a mobile sawblade which charges towards you spinning itself.
Outrunning it is quite easy due to its slow base speed.

• Shotgun weapons: Each shot impacts and pushes them away.
  
• Shields: Block their ramming attacks and outrange them.
  
• Saw Arm: A well-timed attack against whirling Sawblades easily pushes them away with a high verocity. Be cautious when you're at a narrow space as they bounce off the wall,

Bully

Bully itself is harmless alone, but is beyond a mere annoyance when other threats are nearby.

Tattletale

It's a mobile Trip-Laser alarm emitter, wanders around a certain small area searching for you.
Once it detects your presence, It opens its front cover to activate an inbuilt Trip-Laser alarm emitter to call fellow drones through the ship.
Try to shoot it from afar or behind before the situation gets worse.

Trip-Laser can be blocked by any shield or walls.

Slimer

This drone spews harmful green gel towards you, and sprays more toward every direction when it's destroyed.
The green gel damages everything it touches even if it's other enemies, which can be your advantage against a pack of enemies.

Green gel can be blocked by any shield!
If you have one, raise it to protect yourself.
Gel takes a while until it disappears, keep your shield raised.
If don't have one, take a safe distance and outrange them.

Hazard Coating makes you immune to gel.
If you're using Salamander suit initially equipped with this passive item, Slimer is your friend.
I usually don't bother with the item as outranging Slimer or simply taking cover behind a wall is enough, of course each evasive action costs some time though.

Mr. Fixit

As its name says, Mr.Fixit is a support drone with repair ability.
It can restore not only other damaged drones but also damaged systems, annoys you by prolonging fight and forcing you to spend more ammo.
Thankfully its number on each level isn't that high, and it's lightly armored thus destroying it is a piece of cake.



Repair beam can restore through walls and its range is long.

Ironclad

Ironclad generates an octagonal barrier as soon as it takes a hit, making itself invulnerable for several seconds.
Weapons with firepower immense enough to bring heavy damage in one hit is required to destroy an Ironclad.

Heavy Sentinel

While its slow speed allows you to simply outrun and ignore, sooner or later fighting Heavy Sentinels will become inevitable as more and more of them spawn from Drone Factory systems and eventually overwhelm you with its number.
It deals a rapid fire of high speed bullets while generating an energy shield forward and blocks most weapons' attack.

It doesn't rotate nor move during its firing sequence, and its gun's firing arc is quite limited, simply covering front area making its back completely vulnerable as this screenshot shows.

Effective weapons against Heavy Sentinels

• Tractor Beam: While it can blocked by the energy field, it can capture a Heavy Sentinel, turn into a useful shield or bullet. It's definitely the easiest solution against Heavy Sentinels.
  
• HMG-P (Heavy Machinegun - Piercing) : its bullet can literally pierce energy shield
  
• Any weapon that cause explosion:
  
• Melee weapons:

Leviathan

A mobile factory of Spikedogs, which constantly spawns a bunch of them.

Juggernaut

Juggernaut is the worst of all the defense drones with high durability and deadly weapons, they wander through the ship searching for you.

Juggernauts can move through walls when you're not nearby.

Juggernaut's variations

Each Juggernaut's weapon varies based on the level of the Juggernaut Factory system it's spawned from.

Level 1: Juggernaut fires 5 shots simultaneously at short interval to cover a wide range, each shot can be blocked by shields or melee weapons like saw.







Level 2: Juggernaut launches single self-guided bomb at short interval, which follows you until it hit you, and explodes on hitting you or being destroyed or passing certain time from its launch, this makes melee weapons useless.

Outrunning Juggernauts: Make sure you can keep running.

Checking the map frequently saves you.

Never be hesitent to fight when you have to.
Keep running becomes more difficult on latter levels, especially when a Sensor Jammer system is active.
Incoming Juggernauts divert your attention from deployed mines or Cage Generators.



(Click to enlarge)

How to defeat Juggernauts

Secure a safe area large enough to deal with Juggernauts first.
Don't mindlessly rush to Juggernaut Factory systems to stop its spawn.
On latter ships, it's more difficult to stop the 1st wave of Juggernauts, thus securing a safe space by clearing every threat such as turrets or drones or other hazards is cruicial especially when the ship has a Sensor Jammer system.
Watch out for deployed mines and Cage Generators and Tattletales, you don't want to activate them nor trigger alarm.
Once you spot Juggernauts lure them to the cleared space.

Isolate Juggernauts by eliminating other drones nearby.
Take their companies first and lure the Juggernauts to the cleared space.
1 or 2 of level 2 Juggernauts aren't that tough as long as you keep a certain distance and other enemies don't interrupt.

Juggernauts aren't hindered by walls, but their shots and bombs are.
In an open space, move around the Juggernaut attacking it, keep a safe distance to deal with launched bombs.
When your suit doesn't have a booster, be more cautious.
In narrow space, attack the Juggernaut and retreat, repeat this process destroying launched bombs.
Corners are your advantage to prevent bombs' passage, where Smart guns are quite useful.

Outrange Juggernauts.
This is quite simple, works well with most weapons.

Utilize nearby hazards.
This is quite situational, it works well though.
Destroy nearby Nuclear Containment Cells, Stasis Tanks, EMP Generators.
Nuclear explosions easily melt Juggernauts, Tank's gel continuously damages them, EMP disables them long enough for your advantage.

My example

On this screenshot, I managed to defeat a level 2 Juggernaut using a default shotgun, no EMP or Cloak or Nuke is used and I didn't take cover.

All I did was moving around the Juggernaut and shoot launched bombs with shotgun.
One shot is enough to destroy multiple bombs and remaining pellets hurt the Juggernaut.

Useful equipments against Juggernauts

• Nuke weapons: Ensure you safe escape from the nuclear explosion.
  
• EMP-Field: One of the best items against Juggernaut.
  
• EMP-Shotgun or EMP-Blaster: They temporarily disable Juggernaut.
  
• Machinegun weapons: Their rapid fire safely destroys launched bombs while damaging Juggernaut, its relatively lower fire power prolongs the fight and consumes lots of ammo though.
  
• Smart guns: They can hit the Juggernaut around a corner.
  
• Shotgun weapons: Aim the bomb, multiple pellets destroy the bomb easily and hurt the Juggernauts simultaneously.
  
• Laser: Its continuous attack can deal with both the Juggernaut and its bombs simultaneously.
  
• Tractor Beam: Capture a drone, launch it toward the Juggernaut and run. repeat this process. Watch out for the bombs and remember that the launch verocity of bigger drones is greatly reduced.

Turrets

Turrets are wall-mounted and immobile.
Each turret shoots only when you're within its detection range and there's a clear line of fire between you and the turret.

All the turrets are controled by their corresponding systems, eliminating which shuts them down.
Flak turrets belong to flak controller systems, Picket and Jockey to sentry systems, alarm emitter to alarm systems.

Picket (controled by Sentry systems)

Picket is a small turret which fires single shot towards you at small interval, whose shot can easily be blocked by shield or melee such as saw, deflected by Jennet's unique ability.

Warden Picket (controled by Sentry systems)

Warden Picket is a more annoying version of Picket, scatters a volley of bright shots, each of which loses velocity and remains for while like a mine.

Jockey (controled by Sentry systems)

Jockey is a sniper turret with an extremely long range and tremendous verocity, which can shoot you whereever you are as long as a clear line between you and Jockey is.

While Jockey's presence can be easily known by its pink pointing laser and a unique sound heard during its gun's charging process, and it needs a long interval to actually shoot, its shot's insanely fast speed shouldn't be underestimated especially when multiple Jockeys watch an open space with less obstacles, you hardly can react to their shots especially when they're coming from outside of screen.

Jockey doesn't react to your deployed turrets.

Trip-laser alarm emitter (controled by Alarm systems)

It's a laser emitter not exactly a turret, which simply projects a laser which raises alarm to draw all the drones across the ship to where the alarm is raised once you touch it.
The emitter itself is quite vulnerable.

Trip-Laser itself can be blocked by any shield.

Flak turret (controled by Flak Control system)

These are point-defense turrets mounted on exterior walls to watch out intruders.
Their high-speed guided shots are quite deadly and hard to avoid.

Hazards

Toxic Spray

This has nothing to do with Hazard system.
Spray hurts everything it touches, including enemy drones!

Mines (controled by Hazard System)

Shields can't block mine's explosion!

Mines detect you even while Cloaking Weaver is active.

Sawblade

A rail-mounted saw, its movement is limited on a rail so avoiding it alone isn't much of a problem.

Saws can be temporarily disabled by EMP.

Saws can hurt everything it touches, including enemy drones!
This can be exploited as your advantage.

Cage Mine

It's an immobile and indestructible trap waiting for you to get close to its proximity, once it detects your presence it activates an energy cage to trap you inside.
The energy field doesn't affect other enemies or their shot, which gives them a great opportunity to eliminate you.



You can interact with cage generator itself to deactivate its energy field if you're in a hurry, it asks you to enter a short randomly generated command like this, which consists of 4 keys. (up, left, down, right)
Enter the required command while pressing interact key and generator deconstructs itself, you're free.




It's possible to escape energy field before it's activated.

Casket

Casket is an immobile and highly durable stasis cell which reacts to your presence nearby by spawning Hornet drones, during which is the biggest chance to damage it as it reveals its vulnerable inside (purple part).
Its outer shell blocks most weapons, which makes Caskets annoying obstacles.
Spawned hornets disappear in time, which takes quite a time though.

• Saw Arm: It can damage a Casket bypassing its outer shell, is also useful to repel Hornet drones.
  
• Explosives weapons: their blast damages a Casket through the outer shell.
  
• Outrunning: Don't bother with Caskets when you don't need to.

Bumper

Bumper is harmless until you accidentally touch it.

Wall Saw

A wall-mounted and indestructible giant saw.
It isn't much of a trouble alone as it's limited to movement on the rail it's attached to.
Wall Saw becomes a true threat when other enemies are nearby, one Bully or Spikedog or turret is enough.

Wall Saws aren't controled by Hazard systems!

EMP Generator

Once it's destroyed, it generates an EMP field to interfere nearby drones, turrets, and systems.

EMP can be your advantage!
When an EMP Generator is spotted nearby any system, destroy it first so that you can take the system safely.
Remember EMP affects your Pocket Turrets.

Stasis Tank

This tank sprays the same green gel (it's harmful!) as Slimer drone spews when it's destroyed.

Gel can be blocked with any shield!
If your suit is equipped with one, raise it just after shooting the tank.
If your suit doesn't have any shields, shoot the tank from a safe distance.

Nuclear Cell

This glowing thing contains a NUCLEAR REACTOR!
I warn you, make sure you secure your escape route before messing with it.
Nuclear explosion spread through walls!


If a Nuclear Containment Cell is nearby a system, destroy it and run.


Hey, I warned you!

Suit analysis: Gunhead

Pros

• Boost Jet ability is useful for both fast travel and combat maneuvability.
  
• Balanced combination of initial equipments.

Cons

• Ram Spike is powerless on latter levels as it's not suitable to deal with a pack of enemies.

Unique ability: Boost Jet for faster and safer travel

Weapons are available for use even while Boost Jet is active.
This synergies well with the initial shield, and Tractor Beam.
You can wade through dangers intact by activating the boost ability with the shield raised.

(Click to enlarge)

Shield: Move raising it!

The default shield covers your front and blocks most attacks from enemies except explosions from bombs or mines.
Every successfully block drains shield's battery by a certain amount, this makes the shield a temporary defense, its battery restores automatically while it's not used.
Don't rely too much on shield and combine it with avoid maneuver so that your odd to survive greatly increases.

Any shield can block Trip-Laser alarm or harmful green gel!

Ram Spike for attack, defense, and emergency escape

Other initial weapons: Medium Machinegun & High Explosive Grenades

These 2 weapons serve you well during several early salvage operations.
Well timed grenade's explosion inflicts a significant damage on multiple parts of level 1 core system.

Suit analysis: Rook

Pros

• Initially equipped with Tractor Beam, a quite versatile melee weapon.
  
• Initially equipped EMP Field saves you from difficult situations.
  
• Highly durable thanks to its unique shield.
  
• Its passive ability reduces impact from enemy attacks and explosions.

Cons

• Tractor Beam needs small drones to utilize.
  
• Lack of booster hinders quick move or escape.
  
• Unique shield makes you immobile, and it can't block damage from bomb's explosions.

Tractor Beam: Enemy drones are your shields and bullets.

Once you activate Tractor Beam, it captures an enemy drone.
The captured drone can be used as a temporal shield against other enemies' shots, or can be released toward the crosshair with a high verocity by activating Tractor Beam again, which turns it into a high speed bullet against other enemies.
The clash destroys the launched drone and terribly hurts the other enemies it hits, sending the captured drone against walls simply destroys the captured drone.


(Click to enlarge)

You can use your weapons dragging a captured drone, including Rook's unique shield.

• Tractor Beam can capture the following drones: Spikedog, Jackal, Bomber, Heavy Sentinel, Sawblade, Mr.Fixit, Bully.
  
• Bigger drones like Sawblade or Heavy Sentinel are launched with a less verocity.
  
• Tractor Beam requires a fully charged battery for use and each use completely depletes it.
  
• Mr.Fixit even tries to repair the captured drone, useful?

EMP Field: your savior

EMP's blast disables every drone, system, turret within its range.
It'll show its extreme potential against a pack of enemies or Repair system or Central Core with higher level.

EMP also affects your deployed turets, makes them temporarily unrecoverable.

Unique ability: Blockade Shield

Rook's ability is to deploy a sphere shaped energy field which is completely free from common issues its counterparts share, like energy supply or recharge.
This ability makes Rook ideal to deal with Sentry Systems or Core System as you don't need to take cover.
These are examples of how effective Rook's unique shield is. (Click to enlarge)

Nuke, Rook's best friend.

Rook's unique shield can even withstand a nuclear explosion!

Thus Nuclear Defense Systems or Nuclear Reactors can be exploited safely for your cause.
Detonate a nuke, raise Rook's unique shield and every single drone, system, turret in the fire is consumed, except you.

Perfect shiled? There's no such thing!

Rock's unique shield can't block explosions, it makes you completely immobile while it's raised!
Watch out for Bomber's plasma bombs or Juggernaut's guided bombs or deployed mines.
Raising shield against a pack of Hornet drones when a Casket is nearby simply worsens the situation.

Suit analysis: Jennet

Pros

• Initially equipped Quality Ammo (passive item) doesn't require an item slot.
  
• Every weapon's damage output increases by 20% thanks to Quality Ammo.
  
• Initial 2 Pocket Turrets are quite effective against small drones, and they're recoverable.

Cons

• 2 less weapon slots make it less flexible, highly dependent on luck, especially on rogue mode.
  
• Unique ability hardly affects bigger drones.
  
• Remote Nuke is too valuable to waste on early ships, thus becomes a dead weight for a while.
  
• Pocket Turrets placement requires caution as they're quite vulnerable.

2 less weapons, 2 more items, is it good?

Jennet suit only has 2 weapons slots, which requires you to be more selective about weapons to equip.
Energy weapons suffer limited battery, melee ones lack both range and firepower so I'm skeptical about them for Jennet, except Saw Arm.
Thanks to its passive item, damage output receives a bonus of 20% thus any weapons can be deadly.

• Heavy machinegun: initially equipped one well suffices.
  
• Minigun
  
• Assault shotgun
  
• Saw Arm

Unique ability: Knockback Pulse (Drunk Rocket's best friend)

This ability generates a power field towards every direction, which can deflect certain types of enemy shot and push away small drones.
It can also send your grenades or rockets with high verocity, which turns Drunk Rocket to an extremely reliable weapon by fixing its unpredictable course.

Knockback Pulse can defect Jockey's fast shots, which might be worth a try when you have to.

• Knockback Pulse pushes these enemies away further: Jackal, Spikedogs, Hornet drones, activated mines.
  
• It can deflect shots from Jackal, Picket, Jockey, Bomber.
  
• It hardly affects these drones: Sawblade, Heavy Sentinel, Juggernaut (level 2 bombs)

Pocket Turret : your fragile pal

• Deployed turrets fire against nearby enemy drones or turrets.
  
• Enemies except Jockey turrets target deployed turrets and eventually destroy them.
  
• Deployed turrets don't target any systems nor hazards (deployed mines or Nuclear Cells).
  
• Shots from deployed turrets can be reflected by Shield system and hurt you.
  
• Deployed turrets don't trigger Trip-Laser alarm nor mines.
  
• Deployed turrets are affected by EMP's effect, during which they can't be recovered.

How to keep your turrets safe.

Turrets greatly help you get rid of Repair systems quickly.
First deploy your turrets nearby the Repair system without disrupting a clear line between you and the Repair system.

Once everything is ready, pull your trigger against the Repair system and your turrets start attacking spawned Hornet drones hurting the system, remember to activate Knockback Pulse as frequent as possible, which keeps Hornet drones away from you and your turrets.

Remote Nuke: remember to arm it.

Remote Nuke is a deployable nuclear bomb
You need to arm the deployed Remote Nuke before detonating it.
Arming process uses the same system as Cage Generator and Door Lock system.

Suit analysis: Salamander

Pros

• Initially equipped with 1 each of Saw Arm and Flamer and Shield, which is versatile to various situations.
  
• Afterburner ability allows you to damage enemies while moving.
  
• Inbuilt Hazard Coating protects you from harmful gel.

Cons

• Afterburner's verocity is slower than Gunhead's Booster Jet, weapons are unavailable while it's active.
  
• Saw Arm is powerless against big drones, especially Juggernaut equipped with guided bombs.
  
• Slime Morter is hard to utilize.
  
• Hazard Coating is lackluster due to rare encounters with Slimer drones or gel tanks.

Unique ability: Afterburner

Afterburner allows Salamander suit to perform a dash boost leaving a trail of fire behind, which can damage enemies.

Afterburner makes your weapons unavailable while it's active.

Hazard Coating: auto-win against Slimer

It's a passive item which makes you immune to green gel or fire.
With this, Salamander can mindlessly dare a close range combat against Slimer drones with no harm, or safely use its flamethrower against Shield systems.

Flamer: Burn, burn, burn.

Initially equipped Flamer's continuous fire covers quite a wide range, it can protect you from incoming Hornet drones while attacking Repair systems or Caskets simultaneously.

Saw Arm: the most versatile melee

Saw covers a wide range, which enables you to inflict damage on Sentry and Alarm systems, bypassing their outer shells.
It also gives you an advantage when you fight at corners as most enemies' attacks are linear and blocked by a wall, through which your Saw can attack freely though.

Slime Mortar, what?

I'm not sure how to maximize its potential yet.

Suit analysis: Infiltrator

Pros

• Pointing laser enables more accuracy.
  
• Hushpuppy enables stealth play, greatly reduces the difficulty on campaign mode.
  
• Translocator ability allows you to save plenty of time with a proper plan.
  
• Cloaking Weave enables moving through a hoard of enemies undetected.

Cons

• Hull can't be upgraded more than 5.
  
• Reflect Shield isn't as effective and reliable as the default one.
  
• EMP-Blaster is less effective than EMP-Shotgun.
  
• Most of initial weapons suffer limited ammo on rogue mode.

Unique ability: Translocator

Once you activate the ability, a teleporter is launched, which is displayed on map screen.
When you activate the ability with a launched teleporter, you're teleported back to the location of the launched teleporter, and the teleporter disappears so that you can launch another one.

Hushpuppy: a deadly and silent sniper rifle

Hushpuppy's the only stealth weapon that allows you to eliminate enemies one by one without making other enemies alert, which will be your savior on campaign mode.
Its longer reload makes it less effective against a pack of alert enemies, so prepare other weapons to deal with them when things get messy.
Hushpuppy isn't that reliable on rogue mode due to its limited ammo.

Reflect Shield: Juggernaut killer?

Reflect Shield is the default shield with higher power consumption and the ability to deflect enemy shots.
In order to reflect enemy shots back to its source or other enemies, you need to angle the shield precisely, which isn't a problem when you deal with Juggernauts, whose bombs scatter a lot of shots.

Cloaking Weave

Deployed mines can detect you under cloak.

[parowoz]

"you crash and burn out there and we'll get slapped with expenses. if we go into the Red, our contract gets torched"

[parowoz]

so, what the girl says after first mission (like dont destroy everything, or there will be nothing to salvage) is about hull and ammo pods? she means not to use them, right?

[siscrocket21]

You should add about sentry system laser-now they can shoot through wall and killing you if you came into contact with core system. This game has a lot of bug and inconsistencies.

[MeaslyTripod]

Thanks, yeah current Juggernauts shoot spread bombs, older ones were much bigger and more durable and shot guided bombs that didn't scatter shots.
I always carry a shield so that I can block scattered shots.
I haven't updated my guide at all, I have to do something.

[Edwyndham]

Reflect shield is a lot better than you're giving it credit for. Makes dealing with Juggernauts VERY easy

[MeaslyTripod]

I'm currently adding more details and covering newly implemented contents, I haven't played the game for a while.

I...use default machine gun against shield system, get close to the system and shoot at short and correct intervals...it's possible but quite deadly so I can't recommend at all!

[MechaTails]

I think you should point out that Hornets disappear on their own after a few seconds, so shielding is definitely an effective way of dealing with them.

@Shodo
I think the Vulcan Laser is one of the safest ways, the Shield System doesn't reflect its shots.

[Shodimmsdale Shodimmadome]

Safest way of dealing with shield generators is actually using grenades, preferrably sticky nades. They stick to the surface of the shields themselves and the explosion radius takes a nice chunk out of them. They are also immensely useful for popping other security systems, then darting back into cover.