I have nothing against watching videos, but I really would rather just jump in and start playing. To that end, this is here to point out a few things that are not immediately evident.

All of this is covered in detail by other individuals. This guide does not serve that purpose. This is simply to get you going without too much staring at the screen with a blank look.

I'm not an expert by any means, and I'll try to keep adding to this as I play, these are just things I have found that I thought would have been nice to know up front.

I hope it helps.

So sandbox was very rudely removed from the full release of game. In this case, I would just recommend setting the AI to easy and giving yourself a major advantage while you learn the ropes. It's still pretty one sided.

Building has a few little secrets that you will find out on your own... eventually. Let me speed this up for you.

Faster unit production: Select an idle contruction unit, then right click on one of your production factories. This unit will be assigned to help that factory build. Essentially each unit the factory produces will get a little help from the builder. Assign multiples to make it faster. At this time, there doesn't seem to be any stipulation on who can help with what. This also works with helping build structures faster too, if you hadn't already considered that. Keep in mind that this increases that unit's build costs, but this can be negligible...

Shift is your friend!!!!: Hold shift to queue structures just like pretty much every other RTS. Hold shift and drag and look at the queued sites multiply!! Makes building a whole lot of something really easy. Oh, and this works with metal extractors too. Shift and drag the mouse and a circle will emerge from the mine. Each metal site that this encompasses will get marked for extractor construction. It seems that there isn't any limit on how many you can queue with this.

Walls are buit AoE style, meaning you can click and drag them.


It seems the commander is somewhat amphibious. He goes under the water to build if required. (Thank you Hawkeye™)


You can salvage destroyed buildings and units for a little bit of resources or to just get it out of the way. I'm not honestly sure the effects of doing it on your operating buildings and structures other than to just remove them.

The assist option on workers will allow you to right click the worker you wish for your selected unit to help build. If they have a large queue of projects to do then workers assigned as assist will help them complete all tasks. They will continue to help if you assign the main unit another project after it goes idle. If you hold shift you will see a blue circle around units that have been assigned assistants.

Though it will be pretty obvious pretty quick, you need a balance of metal and energy to be able to produce things efficiently. If you are running negative on either resource, then your construction speed grinds way down. You will still build what you have queued, but you might want a book to read while you wait.

Construction is the primary time when you are using energy and metal. In essence, you could posibly play the game with only a few energy and metal plants, but your production would be one unit/building at a time if you want it to go efficiently. In my opinion, you want about a 1:1 ratio of energy factories to metal extractors for the first bit of the game. This is what I do and it just seems to work pretty well. Once you have the ability, make advanced energy factories which will allow you to construct more items at a faster pace as energy is the main resource used in construction.

The rate of usage for metal and energy during construction is determined by the producing unit/structure, not the item being built, though the item being built does have a total cost. This determines the build speed of the unit. Advanced units have a much higher construction rate than the basics, but also a much higher energy use.

Orbital builders can build a teleporter on the ground of a new planet. This is the best way to move an army to that world. Be sure to protect the builders with orbital fighters and the teleporter with bombardment satellites.

Orbital builders can assist with ground construction when assigned to assist a planet based construction unit. Not sure if this was intentional.

In the upper right of the screen is a planet dropdown for the entire system. You can use this to quickly move from one planet to another. Oh, and those little square looking thingys underneath each one? That's how many engines it takes to move it. And they light up in green when that engine has been built.

Radar allows your artillery units to attack targets that are hidden by the fog of war. Placing one near a central artillery hub will greatly increase their effectiveness.

Orbital radar satellites are really useful for keeping any eye on the whole planet. One unit has a huge range of sight. Just make sure to protect it. These work awesome with catapults (made by advanced builders.)

Losing all energy will shut down your radar. Not a huge deal (I expected turrets to fail too) but it can be a problem if you rely on a lot of artillery.

Rubble provides limited cover for your units from towers and other units.

Trenches on metal planets are great for all kinds of things as they are covered from direct fire produced by ground units. My favorites are radar and artillery. Use air protection though.

The fabrication aircraft reminds me of Lazerbeak.[en.wikipedia.org] This is a good thing.

Telportation stations need to be connected after building. Click on one, then right click on the one you want it to connect to. Then move units through with the normal movement commands.

Orbital carriers only carry one unit. Plan accordingly.

There is a build tier system in this. Each step gives you access to something different.
Basically:
Commander -> Basic structures -> Specialized build units -> Advanced structures -> Advanced specialized units. Advancing gives you new units, better tools, and some fun toys.

Delete blows up buildings/units. You then need to clear the rubble if you want to rebuild in that area.

Turning off a building's power use doesn't seem to effect your energy usage. If it is functionaing as it is presenting, all you are doing is taking the building offline with no real benefit to you.


Click N Drag:

They use click and drag (meaning make your selection, hold click then drag your mouse) to do a ton of things. You can use this for mass repairs, mass buildings, and MASS ATTACKING!!! Try it with orbital satellites!

To repair a mess of units/structures click on repair, then hold click and drag. It will give you an influence sphere to repair in.

Caps lock will toggle on the queued structures. Good for planning.

"Something I discovered in sandbox, you can see the energy or meatal being used/produced by a unit by hovering over it. It will tell you the amounts in the lower left corner next to the icon for each resource." - Thank you Mr Redlego.
This number actually seems to display the current costs that a unit is producing.
Further investigation on this shows what seems to be a specific energy cost for each build unit to construct something regardless of what they are building. This cost is displayed in that same area. It seems the cost of construction (metal and energy) is doubled if two units are on working on one project, though the object is constructed faster. Basically it costs the same in the end, just a higher load for a shorter period of time.

Not much, I know. I promise to keep updating as I find more interesting stuff. If you really need more, check out the plethora of videos on their site and all over the place.

Feel free to leave anything else you find that you would like to contribute in the comments and I'll try to get it put in here for other players.

I hope I helped you out.