Space Engineers

Space Engineers

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Player Guide for Space Ace's Extreme Hardcore Survival Modpack
By Space Ace
A simple player guide to help you stay generally on-track of progression in my modpack found here

This guide is intentionally a bit vague, because where's the fun in having all the answers. If you have any specific progression questions, or are stuck, I am active on both Steam and Discord and would love to help you out!
   
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World Setup
Recommended Game Settings:
* means "Required"
This pack is to be specifically used on the Star System vanilla preset.

Global Modifiers
*Assembler Efficiency: Realistic (Other options will result in fractions of components)
Refinery Speed: Preference
Block Inventory: Realistic
Character Inventory: Realistic
Welding Speed: Preference
Grinding Speed: Preference
View Distance: Based on your PC specs. Above 30km is kinda pointless
Max Objects: Anywhere from 250-750 based on PC specs. Higher is better for hand mining
*Max blocks per player: Disabled
*Max ship size: Disabled

Environment
Lightning: Off
Weather: On
Radiation: Preference
*Sun Rotation: On
*Day Duration: 1h or longer
Asteroid amount: Normal
Meteor Activity: Preference
*World Size: Unlimited
Sound Mode: Realistic
Solar Radiation Intensity: Preference

Survival
Auto Healing: Off
Delete Respawn Ship: Off
*Autorespawn: Off
Jetpack: On
*Oxygen: On
*Air-tightness: On
*Progression: Off
*Respawn Ships: On
*Space Suit Respawn: Off
Spawn with tools: On
Optimal spawn distance: Preference
Respawn Cooldown: Preference (disable if you are picky about your starting location)
Food consumption rate: Moderate
Enable survival buffs: On
Enable reduced stats on respawn: On

Encounters and NPCs
Cargo Ships: On
Drones: On
*Economy: On
Random Encounters: On
Enable Planetary Encounters: On
Wolves: Off (Handled by MES)
Spiders: Off (Handled by MES)
*Unknown Signals: On
Animal Limit: 32
Global Encounter Cap: 1
Random Encounter Density : Low

Combat and PvP
*Destructible Blocks: On
Aim assist: Preference
Bounties: Preference
Friendly Rocket Damage: Off
*Weapons: On

Misc
Offline broadcast distance: Preference
Spectator: Off
Show Player Names: Preference (does not affect AI bots)
Thruster Damage: On
Tools shake: On
Voxel Hand: Off
3rd Person: Preference (If you would prefer an alternative with nerfed character 3rd person only, disable 3rd person and use this mod instead https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2923698329)
Convert to station: On
Voxel Destruction: On
Remote block removal: Preference
*Scrap Drops: On
*Temp Containers: On

Experimental Settings
*Ingame Scripts: On
*Share Inertia Tensor: On
Unsafe Piston Torques: On
Unsafe Rotor Torques: On
Unsupported Stations: Off
Adaptive sim: Preference
Perma Death: Preference
Reset Ownership: Off
Subgrid Damage: Off
*Supergridding: On
Total PCU: Disabled
Block limits: Off

-Load order matters for multiple mods. This is the current working load order.

- You will have to place the water yourself. Don't go crazy with the depth or you'll be building submarines when you go to complete the story. I recommend only adding water to Earth and Alien, with a height of 1.0158 on Earth, and 1.017 on Alien. For help adding the water refer to the official guide and navigate to the "Server Settings" section.

- You must disable "AdvLift" in the Aerodynamic Physics mod, or you will only get one faction's ships spawning on planets. To do so, have an admin use Alt + F10, Then go to the top left "Mod Settings" --> Aerodynamic Physics --> Physics --> Advanced Lift. Set this value to "False"
Stage 1: Fresh out of the pod
1. If you just started the save, turn off AdvLift and add the water (if using manual setup)

2. If your landing location ends up in water, press backspace and find a new landing location.

3. Gather your bearings and look out for lower areas to locate water as soon as possible.

4. Use the food in the pod barrel for your first sustenance.

4 1/2.Cutting trees yields Logs Logs can either be made into Fire Wood for the Wood Furnace Generator, or made into planks. These planks are unaffected by the scrap mod and float in water. Very ideal for scaffolding and early floating craft.

5. Using the refining from your survival kit, setup an Assembling Bench either on your lander or on a new large grid. If you are using a large grid Bench you will need to setup 1-3 Wind Turbines. Keep in mind the current wind speed and your location's altitude will affect the output of your turbines. When constructing, remember you may want to connect the wind turbine grid to your landing pod. If you are having power troubles, a Wood Furnace Generator may be useful. Don't forget about the one pre-installed on your pod!

6. If you like your landing location, skip to step 9. If not, go to step 7.

7. Using metal wheels, turn your landing pod into a rover and begin surveying the area for a new location. A waterside base is recommended for easy access to unlimited ice for hydrogen. (Tip: A fully submerged and powered collector block will automatically collect ice.) If your survival kit is destroyed now it's game over so be careful.

8. Once you have located a new suitable location, return to step 5.

9. With the Assembling Bench, create the parts for a Smelter. Both small and large grid smelters use a decent amount of power. Connect your lander to the wind turbine grid, and/or stuff your Wood Furnace Generator with Fire Wood, and use your lander's Lithium Battery to even out the power delivery. You can also use Advanced Welding's grinder features & Weld Pads and a rotor to connect your lander's Lithium Battery directly to the large grid if you plan to just scrap your lander. If you don't feel like waiting for the battery to charge, Alkaline Batteries are a cheap option, however they cannot be recharged. Once they're depleted, the block should be completely scrapped and placed again

10. Unknown Signal airdrops will have valuable materials and small Acid batteries available, along with seeds and tools. This is the easiest source of early-game Acid power storage and low-to-mid-tier components. Use Advanced Welding's grinder features to remove the battery easier, and press "R" on a block/grid to pick it up.

11.This will be the longest step in this stage. Construct and equip a vehicle with a metal detector and seismic surveyor and begin searching the landscape for ore. Look for light or dark patches in the dirt to locate ores, or simply use the seismograph. All ores are useful at some point, but you must find Titanium and Coal to begin the next stage. Sometimes certain ores will feel difficult to find, but it is purely luck. Don't give up!

12. Construct a Refinery to process the higher tier ores. Remember to utilize batteries to balance out its high power draw. Yield and Speed modules are disabled and instead ores must be purified in the Rock Crusher and then Ore Purifier for 50% and 100% higher yields respectively. These extra refining steps are unnecessary in the early game, and eat up lots of power and room.

13. Construct a Coal Boiler and Steam Turbine. To prevent coal being wasted you will also need a Steam Buffer Tank. If you already found bauxite, you can make an event controller to auto-switch the Coal Boiler when the buffer tank fills & empties.

You will need to construct a plate stamp to make Titanium Plates for the Turbine. If you don't have Titanium for the plates, you can use a Coal Furnace for a cheap option with lower output and efficiency and low build cost. (Do not connect your turbine directly to a buffer tank. The script sometimes requires at least 1 pipe block between)

Stage 2: Freedom of Power & Power of Freedom
1. With Coal power acquired there is now 50MW of power at your disposal. Build up a stockpile of coal for your boiler and monitor your buffer tank until an event controller is installed to do it for you

2. Industrial Overhaul has numerous machines. Most of them you will need to make before you can assemble the full catalog of components. These machines will take a substantial amount of space, and vertical construction is recommended to keep things compact. Refer to The Official IO Guide for what machines to build for what and when.

3. At this point your freedom of choice begins to open up a bit as you gain access to more components and ores. Don't forget about Trade Stations, as they can be used to purchase ships, tools, foods, and high-tier components you don't have access to yet, like Lithium Power Cells

4. To begin locating the ancient temples you can rarely find datapads from old explorers in the storages of other factions. Trade Stations are a great place to start. Each temple will usually have a location to another temple hidden somewhere inside separate from the artifact.

5. Once you have caught the scent you can follow the trail out to space and other planets. To begin the next stage, gather lake ice and construct a Bio Lab (misspelled "Bio Labor" ingame).

Stage 3: Engineer on the Moon
1. Space in this pack is an unforgiving and harsh place. Oxygen is now a valuable resource and dangerous enemies lurk in the shadows

2. Use your Bio Lab from the end of Stage 2 to make Algae Samples out of Lake Ice. With these samples in an Algae Farm you can generate large amounts of samples over time. These samples can either be put into a composter to create Organic (used for food items) or put back into the Bio Lab to create Photosynthesizing Algae Containers for Algaebased O2 farms. Vanilla O2 farms are still an option, but Algae O2 Farms are far better. Later on you can make Algaebased H2 Farms when you have obtained Alien Lake Ice

3. If you already located Oil Sand you may have been producing fuel(s). Using the separate machines, You can process the OilSand into either Gasoline or Rocket Fuel. The machines for this process are quite large and power-hungry, so be prepared
-Rocket Fuel is a more powerful and more efficient thruster fuel
-Gasoline is an energy-dense fuel used in Gasoline engines to generate large amounts of power.

4. Create your first ship with at minimum one oxygen tank. If you plan on an extended space visit then you will need additional O2 tanks or a gas generator. Remember the generator power requirement is greatly increased so it will cost lots of power to generate O2 from ice in space

5. The moon is the only source of the shiny liquid metal Cesium used in many Ion-based and/or Energy Shield systems. There is also trace amounts of Tantalum and Platinum scattered across the surface. This complete's the catalogue of basic materials, but other more-valuable ores still lie in wait on other planets

Stage 4: Spacefarer
1. To better understand the Mission ahead, refer to the Endgame Expansion guide to understand what each exotic material's location and uses are. You can launch missions to the story temples along-the-way, or collect all the materials and then rush to all the temples at once

2. Asteroids no longer have ores like uranium, platinum, or tantalum. Instead, low and mid-level ores can be found in massive abundance. If you want high-level ores like tantalum, you will have to source it from whichever planets/moons it is found on. Exotics will not be found in space, and each planet will have its own unique exotic tier ore

3. Beware the factions that reside in space. Drones can be seen patrolling around asteroids looking for intruders, and the Mercenaries are always on the hunt for fresh meat. Other threats lurk in space as well...

Stage 5: Endgame
1. You have now probably obtained some of every material in the game. At this point it is a matter of expanding your logistical capabilities and launching further-and-further missions from your home station to complete the main objective

2. There is, unfortunately, nothing particularly interesting that happens when all of the artifacts are collected. Be sure you save the game before collecting the last one, as it will start end-game credits and then send you to the main menu.

3. Once you have found all of the artifacts you have completed the main objective! Further gameplay is all up to you. Build a station on every planet & moon? Establish a space base or three? Maybe take on some Factorum? It's all up to you

Power Generation & Storage
Stage 1

Energy Storage:
- LG Alkaline Battery: 6 MW out / 1 MWh capacity
- SG Alkaline Battery: 100 kW out / 20 kWh
Charge Efficiency: N/A cannot be recharged

Renewable Energy
- Wind Turbine: ~10-300 kW

Furnace Generators:
- SG Wood Furnace Generator: 35 kW
- LG Wood Furnace Generator: 250 kW

- SG Coal Furnace Generator: 150 kW
- LG Coal Furnace Generator: 1 MW

Fueled Generators:
- LG H2/O2 Generator: H2 produced 16.67L/s @ 2 MW
- SG H2/O2 Generator: H2 produced 3.33L/s @ 500 kW

- LG Hydrogen Engine: 5 MW - H2 used 40L/s
- SG Hydrogen Engine: 500 kW - H2 used 4L/s
(Small grid is a net loss and gas generators should only be used for life support. Large Grid is only a 20KW surplus and is better used as power storage rather than generation)


Stage 2

Energy Storage:
- LG Acid Battery: 6 MW out / 1.5 MWh capacity
- SG Acid Battery: 2 MW out / 500 kWh
- SG Small Acid Battery: 75 kW out / 40 kWh
Charge Efficiency: 75%

- LG Capacitor: 250 MW out / 100 kWh capacity
- SG Capacitor: 25 MW out / 10 kWh
Charge Efficiency 100%

Renewable Energy
- Large Wind Turbine: ~4 MW

- LG Solar Panel: 250 kW
- SG Solar Panel: 62.5kW

Fueled Generators:
- Gasoline Refinery Gas produced 80L/s

- LG Gasoline Engine: 15 MW - Gas used 1.5L/s
- SG Gasoline Engine: 1.5 MW - Gas used 0.15L/s

Steam:
- Coal Boiler steam produced: 100L/s
- Solar Concentrator steam produced: <0.5L/s
- Geothermal well steam produced: 7.5L/s for every 100m past 150m

- Steam Turbine: 50 MW - Steam used: 50L/s


Stage 3

Energy Storage:
- LG Lithium Battery: 12 MW out / 3 MWh capacity
- SG Lithium Battery: 4 MW out / 1 MWh
- SG Med Lithium Battery: 1.25 MW out / 320 kWh
- SG Small Lithium Battery: 150 kW out / 80 kWh
Charge Efficiency: 95%

- LG Prototech Battery: 96 MW out / 300 MWh capacity
- SG Prototech Battery: 5.6 MW out / 16 MWh
Charge Efficiency: 98%

Renewable Energy
- LG Full-Spectrum Solar Panel: 700 kW
- SG Full-Spectrum Solar Panel: 175 kW

Nuclear Fusion:
- Prototech Fusion Reactor: 400 MW - H2 used: 1kL/s


Stage 4

Energy Storage:
LG Electron Matrix: 50 MW out / 250 MWh capacity
SG Electron Matrix: 5 MW out / 25 MWh
Charge Efficiency 100%

Steam:
- Nuclear Reactor steam produced 500L/s
- Fast-Neutron Reactor steam produced: 300L/s

Nuclear:
- LG Compact Reactor: 150 MW
- SG Compact Reactor: 10 MW

- LG RTG: 1 MW
- SG RTG: 250 KW

Nuclear Fusion:
- Deuterium Extractor DET produced: 5L/s
- Deuterium Ramscoop DET produced: 2.25L/s @ 100m/s

- Fusion Reactor: 1 GW - DET used: 20L/s
Weapons
Stage 1

Light Gravel Turret
Range: 800m
A weak turret with extremely low cost of operation. Ammo is crafted in the "Gravel Compressor"

Heavy Gravel Turret
Range: 1200m
A slow firing, medium damage cannon. Ammo is crafted in the "Gravel Compressor"

Light Machine Gun
Range: 1000m
A weaker, faster firing autocannon. Can use low-damage CLG Boxes when necessary

Shotgun
Range: 800m
Fires many pellets in a cone. High damage at close range. The older-style loading mechanism allows for use of low-damage CLG Shells when necessary

CLG Autocannon
Range: 1000m
A medium fire rate, low damage turret that fires CLG autocannon rounds

Stage 2
Ammo for these weapons is made in the munitions factory

Mortar
Range: 600m
Fires a very slow heavy-explosive capable of being lobbed at nearby enemies

Gatlings
Range: 1000m
Your usual, run-of-the-mill vanilla gatlings

Rockets
Range: 1500mAI-2500m
Your usual, run-of-the-mill vanilla rockets/missiles

Light Turret
Range: 800m
Interior turret form-factor, now with a slower fire rate and higher damage

Autocannons
Range: 1000m
Your usual, run-of-the-mill vanilla autocannons

Rifled Shotgun
Range: 800m
Fires many pellets in a cone. Has a rifled barrel for tighter spread, and a modern loading mechanism

Assault Cannon
Range: 1400m
Your usual, run-of-the-mill vanilla Assault Cannon

Artillery
Range: 2000m
Your usual, run-of-the-mill vanilla Artillery

Standard 155mm Cannons
Range: 2000m
A single barrel weapon capable of dealing medium damage against armored targets

Standard 305mm Cannons
Range: 2000m
A single or dual-barreled weapon capable of dealing heavy damage against armored targets

Heavy Artillery
Range: 3000-5000m
A long-range high-power cannon with lots of drop. Take out your enemies from safely behind cover

after obtaining quartz
Flak
Range: 1500m
Fires an explosive payload that will auto detonate after traveling 1500m

Vulcan Gatling
Range: 1000m
The bigger brother of the gatling gun. A pinnacle of engineering

Hellfire Rockets
Range: 1500mAI-2500m
Hellfire rockets are smaller and do less damage, but can be tightly packed for intense missile barrages

Railgun
Range: 15000m
Your usual, run-of-the-mill vanilla Railgun

Small Railgun
Range: 5000m
Your usual, run-of-the-mill vanilla small Railgun
(this is updated ahead-of-time. railguns do not currently require quartz)

Stage 3

Coilgun
Range: 6000m
Fires a heavy magnetic sabot at extremely high velocities and over long distances

Ion Cannon
Range: 2000m
Fires a mass of electrically-charged ions at a high velocity. Ion projectiles deal splash damage

Stage 4
Ammo for these weapons is made in the heavy munitions factory

Enforcer Cannon
Range: 4000m
Similar to the Ion Turret, this weapon fires an even larger mass of electrically-charged ions with a higher velocity and fire rate

Ignis Gatling
Range: 2000m
A slow-firing MGL gatling with signature red tracers

Automatic Shotgun
Range: 800m
Fires many pellets in a cone. High fire rate and lots of spread

Lasers
Range: 1500-2500m
Uses Ruby laser tech and energy to blast a continuous beam without ammo management

Burst Flak
Range: 2000m
Fire intense salvos of explosive payloads to carpet the skies

Sniper 155mm Cannon
Range: 4000m
A 155mm Cannon with increased damage and greatly increased range

Burst 155mm Cannon
Range: 2000m
A 155mm Cannon that fires heavy shells in a 3-round burst

Sniper 305mm Cannon
Range: 5000m
A 305mm Cannon with increased damage and greatly increased range

Burst 305mm Cannon
Range: 3500m
A 305mm Cannon that fires heavy shells in an intense 8-round burst

Supercooled Coilgun
Range: 8000m
Uses better construction materials and fabricating methods to acieve all-sround better performace

Stage 5

Gazer Laser
Range: 5000m
With specially aligned lenses and nano-tech, this laser is able to remain at high power for long distances

Warden Laser
Range: 2500m
With specially aligned lenses and nano-tech, this laser is able to deliver extreme destruction within a medium range
Revamped Ore Generation
Ores will be rarer than usual, and are completely random. Large oreless patches of land may be found from time-to-time. Also take note that Lithium is no-longer available on Earth

Planet
Earth
Moon
Mars
Europa
Alien
Titan
Pertam
Triton
Space
Ice
Ocean, Lakes, Rocks
Poles
Poles
The Ground
Ocean, Lakes, Rocks
Lakes, Rocks
None
The Ground
8.3%
Iron
8.7%
8.3%
9.8%
8%
0%
7.4%
6.9%
7.1%
8.3%
Nickel
8.7%
8.3%
9.8%
8%
8.3%
7.4%
0.9g
7.1%
8.3%
Silicon
8.7%
8.3%
9.8%
8%
4.2%
7.4%
6.9%
7.1%
8.3%
Copper
8.7%
8.3%
9.8%
8%
0%
7.4%
6.9%
7.1%
8.3%
Cobalt
8.7%
8.3%
9.8%
8%
8.3%
7.4%
6.9%
7.1%
8.3%
Silver
4.3%
8.3%
9.8%
8%
8.3%
7.4%
6.9%
7.1%
8.3%
Gold
4.3%
8.3%
9.8%
8%
8.3%
7.4%
6.9%
7.1%
8.3%
Sulfur
8.7%
8.3%
9.8%
8%
8.3%
7.4%
6.9%
7.1%
8.3%
Niter
8.7%
0%
9.8%
0%
4.2%
3.7%
6.9%
3.6%
0%
Oil
8.7%
0%
0%
0%
8.3%
0%
10.3%
0%
0%
Titanium
4.3%
8.3%
9.8%
8%
8.3%
7.4%
6.9%
7.1%
8.3%
Coal
8.7%
0%
9.8%
0%
0%
3.7%
6.9%
3.6%
0%
Bauxite
4.3%
8.3%
9.8%
8%
8.3%
7.4%
6.9%
7.1%
8.3%
Lithium
0%
0%
4.9%
4%
8.3%
7.4%
0%
7.1%
8.3%
Platinum
0%
4.2%
0%
4%
4.2%
7.4%
0%
0%
0%
Tantalum
0%
4.2%
0%
8%
0%
0%
0%
7.1%
0%
Uranium
0%
0%
0%
0%
8.3%
0%
3.4%
3.6%
0%
Exotic
Quartz 4.3%
Pollucite 4.2%
Ruby 4.9%
Sapphire 4%
Potash 4.2%
Diamond 3.7%
Topaz 3.4%
Garnet 3.6%
N/A
Atmospheres
Endgame Expansion changes lots of visuals, but more importantly it drastically changes the planetary atmospheres you may have gotten used to

Planet
Vanilla Atmo Height
New Atmo Height
Vanilla Max Atmo Density
New Max Atmo Density
Vanilla O2 Density
New O2 Density
Earth
14400m
14400m
100%
100%
100%
100%
Moon
N/A
N/A
N/A
N/A
N/A
N/A
Mars
14400m
14400m
~100%
~80%
0%
1%
Europa
1140m
N/A
100%
N/A
0%
N/A
Alien
14400m
18000m
120%
150%
10%
20%
Titan
570m
712m
100%
60%
0%
0%
Triton
3771m
6017m
100%
80%
90%
40%
Pertam
1503m
1879m
100%
120%
100%
100%
13 Comments
ghostlyvirous89 20 Aug @ 9:30pm 
Yeah, I noticed that, I got baited when I typed "Acetech" and clicked on the first option.
ghostlyvirous89 20 Aug @ 9:29pm 
Thanks so much, your a legend for putting a lot of time into a proper modpack
Space Ace  [author] 20 Aug @ 2:37pm 
Also it appears you messaged on the Endgame Expansion mod not the pack page btw
Space Ace  [author] 20 Aug @ 5:16am 
@ghostlyvirous89 Backslash key
ghostlyvirous89 20 Aug @ 1:10am 
I already asked in the main modpack comment section, but how do I remove the massive list of artefact collection from the top left of the screen?
Goopy 20 Aug @ 12:33am 
Thank you a lot
Space Ace  [author] 19 Aug @ 5:21am 
@Sweetie Belle Its found in the Ceramics Furnace. A lot of the vanilla/simpler components can be found in the Production Overhaul user guide above
Goopy 19 Aug @ 3:20am 
Where i can craft glass? I just cant make it to contine my game
not422 25 Jul @ 2:54pm 
Wow, realy impressive. Love it :D
But I'm getting attacked all the time they destroyed both rovers though I have on my 2 block concrete roof 3 Flaks, 3 Hellfire Rocketlauncher, two 305 twin turrets and a vulcan turret.
I can defeat incoming ships but they always hit me and destroy so much. My Concrete does not give enough protection and I'm building now a big hangar for my drilling rover.
Do you have any tips?
I have enough quartz available and placed now some decoys. Do I need just more weapon? Do I have to go to mars for longer range weapons?
Can I somehow catch rockets with a weapon?
Any shared experience would be greatly appreciated!
lugubriousmoron 22 Apr @ 8:02pm 
I'm just coming back here to say how much I love this pack. I suck at it and keep restarting but it's so much fun!