I'm impressed this actually works. It's very cool! That said, I ran into some frustrations that better guidance could fix:

Clear usage instructions would help. The cutesy text wasn’t useful when I just wanted to know how to run it before subscribing.

What’s the difference between the green and yellow buttons? Strong vs weak signals?

What is the dispenser chute for?

Why does it constantly eject materials?

Do I need to feed it materials? How much? What kind? Is that what the rear input is for? A step-by-step explanation of how it works would help.

The LCD info doesn’t mean much without context.

The “Important” note isn't anything actionable. I couldn’t tell if it meant the grid shuts down on paste, after pressing a button, or something else. For UI/UX, focus on what the user needs to do and what the machine does, not internal details.

Overall, great job getting this working. I’ve already pulled a few skins (though nothing rare yet). Very impressive work.

During the Great Skin Hunt:

The limit is 8-10 Strong Signal drops specifically (possibly up to 2 extra in multiplayer games with at least two players present), and 18-20 total skins per 48 hour time period.

~15-30 minute cooldown between drops. Strong/Weak signals have independent drop timers, so you can farm them both at the same time.

I just published this guide with all the info I've accumulated about the event and how to efficiently farm them. =)

is there a daily limit on how much skins you get?

(Just to clarify regarding my last post: I was referring to a save game that was last saved before the Fieldwork update. It's not necessary to use a game build from before Fieldwork. This mod "works"(*) on the current build of the game as of the date of this post).

Just a heads up for the upcoming skin fest: this DOES still work to farm skins (including Strong signals) - it's just a bit weird.

1) It's more reliable using a save game from pre-Fieldwork;
2) If using a pre-Fieldwork save (recommended), you may need to re-paste a fresh cat-oh-lith into your world (I didn't need to, but depending on the state the grid was in when you last saved it could be necessary);
3) You may need to wait/idle in game for awhile until your last skin/signal timer expires (could be anywhere from 15 mins to about an hour). If you load in and see any Unknown Signals active, wait for them to despawn.
4) (The weird bit) You won't see what you get from pressing the buttons (it will always say you found nothing) - but check your Steam Inventory after a short while, and you'll see your skins.

A few minutes before posting this, I just got a Lava Rifle from my Cat-oh-Lith's Strong Signal button, seconds after getting a Leopard Helmet (#6729...) from the Weak Signal button.

apparently its not working anymore as of Fieldwork update, is there any plans to fix it? thanks!

Just adding this for posterity and as a data point: as of 4-27-2025 this still worked perfectly on the latest version of the CONTACT build. If Fieldwork has broken this mod (which I am anticipating), I will try the most recent Contact build and see if it still works there - in which case I will come back and make a mention of that here.

still works, got a police rifle, stoked <3

The drop rate of rewards is dependant on Keen's settings.
This product will not and will never bypass whatever limits they set on those.

worked well on the first day, second day delivered two prizes, third day no prizes as of yet, results pending. will update this comment

I'm not certain, because I have NO knowledge at ALL of how the server side of things work,
but I have the dreadful sense that i have spammed the buttons and have possibly been flagged/blacklisted from the steam servers.

lower rear output connector is a meter offset below when it comes to alignment with big grid connectors but can be managed with collector blocks

place over 100m away from base if you plan on playing the world with cat-oh-lith / can be noisy

don't work

Coming back to SE for a second time, and this thing still works great! This is a staple for any base, to prevent that grindy drop everything and run out for a signal. Add a drop of uranium or sunlight, and a few components, and never chase a signal again.

assuming it still works, which it sounds like it does from what you have said, it operates exactly the same way the crates do. with all the same limits and requirements.

I dont get any skins from this :( It only tells me I didnt get any special item

Alright, i figured it out. In case anyone else is having the same issue check if you got the "AQD - Quality of Life Mod" ( https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1804604586 ) installed. I removed it from my game and now the Cat-Oh-Lith is working just fine. I already got two skins :)
Thanks for this nice piece of high tech!!

Yes, i have scripting enabled and I think the issue comes from a mod. When i started a game without any mods loaded it seems to work!
Thank you Polaris and Deadpoop. Now i will just have to find out which of my 30 or so mods interferes with the Cat-Oh-Lith :)

make sure scripts are enabled, and i find that attaching a cockpit to use Y to power down and up to be an easy way of resetting the machine

did you ..... turn Scripts ON in your game settings ? its in the load file settings.

Can someone explain to me how to set this up properly please?
Whenever i paste the Blueprint into my world (either in Creative or Survival via creative tool mode) it starts with a normal signal button.
Once pressed it shuts down. Now i deactivate and activate the batteries but the thing that makes the buttons either spins out of control to the bottom of the Cat-Oh-Lith or if it does not do that it just doesn't produce any new buttons to push.
All i can see are timer blocks that are built that can never be activated.
Please please please help, all i want is a complete zebra suit :(

relaaxxxx bro. everything is gonna be OK.

Oh, sorry xD
I was kinda confused...
I am still completely new to this game and its skin aspect... Was struggling to understand the way it works. :D

well it did say in the description
[quote]
This does not bypass cool-downs. There is a cool-down of somewhere between 15-60 minutes between each skin drop.
[/quote]

It only gave me one drop, didn't drop anything else since?

you only need creative mode to copy paste the structure, you can switch it ON , paste the structure, switch it back to survival. however, the important thing is you ACTIVATED scripts in the settings for your game. i forgot what its called its been a while. OH and the time if i remember correctly is based on the same time the unknown signals drop. so you cant keep drawing i believe.

Follow up question. Can you start a world in creative and switch it to survival and this still work? Or does it have to be survival from the start?

Quick question I cant find an answer for anywhere. The cooldown timer for rolling for a new item. Is that in-game time (the world its pasted in specifically), or real world time? Given its based off of Steam servers, I would guess real world.

does this work in creative?

I have no problems with scripts, just hadn't enabled them xD

That would do it too :p
A no script version would have to give up features like the filters that stop the welder over stuffing itself with any one part halting its operation, or the grinder over-saturating and starting to drop parts leading to a nasty explosion.
You could probably get away with a bare scafold one though. just keep an eye on it and clear out the welder from time to time if it gets over full. That is generally only an issue in creative though.

I'm dumb, I had forgot to enable scripts on that save, nevermind me xD

I tried attaching a cockpit and pressing y to toggle the catolith on and off, still no button rotation, what's odd is the grid doesn't seem to power down when I hit the button usually either

toggle power off and on again.
Due to the way the buttons work, the first time they are used after each world load they stop all power production from batteires, reactors, solar panels and engins when they are pressed.
It used to be possible to weaponise this to kill any grids power regardless of your access to it ;)

So I just tried pasting this in creative, the button works once but doesn't rotate, any thoughts?

Yeah, getting the projectors into the right spot can be tricky.
The script only rotates the images around one axis, so you need to get the projections into position while leaving that axis at whatever the script set it to.
and you usually get 4 green in a day, and 3 yellow every 2 days though I haven't tried in a fair while.

Also not sure when the skin timer resets to allow you to get more but I got at least 8 from just that morning lol

The welder was up it had parts. I know of the errors your referring to I repeatedly disassembled and reassembled everything multiple times and watched the various errors though there were none to speak of. The projectors were projecting though the projections are off center at first. From there the projectors kept spinning the holo around the outside of the “rotor arm” in a circle slowly.

hmm. any errors would be shown on the yellow screen.
Where that screen is depends on the order the screens were assembled in.
I assume you put the needed parts in so the welder can opperate?
I'd need to know if the projector is putting the active projection in position to be welder up

Nvm ticker just started up but it still doesnt move the rotor

Active:True / Rotor Updated / ticker is always 0 / tool state off

@Plexion I have no say in limits or drop rates. The limits and cooldowns are defined on steams back end. this just presents you with buttons that let you get the skins if the back end determines you are eligible.
if Keen alter the way drop limits, cooldowns or eligibility are determined any skins dropped by this will automatically follow the new rules with no input from me.
It behaves exactly the same way as regular in world generated crates except that it constantly refreshes its buttons.

the rotor isn't spinning? does it say anything on about errors on any of the screens, particularly the programable block itself?

When I try making this in survival after connecting the rotor, projectors, and timer the rotor fails to spin and the projectors cycle the projections around the block randomly. Works perfectly when pasted in though. Any ideas how/if I can get it to work when built in survival?

ah ok. interesting. wonder why they made it so inconsistant to use instead of just saying only 3 strong signals per day and only 4 weak signals per day

Ohh and there is a cool-down between button presses too, so you //cant// grab all the skins you are due each day in 5 minutes. This is again, baked into how the crates work, and this system does not and never will do anything to bypass that even if it could.

I like the game too much to risk Keen banning me from it for screwing with their limits :p
and I have spent too much on steam to risk screwing with Valve's end of it >.>

It >>does not<< bypass the natural cool-down of the skin drops.
I do not know the background of how the cool-down operates and these numbers are just estimates based on my past experience.
If you actively play then the green button (weak signal) should work 3-4 times and reset daily.
Again if you are active the yellow (strong signal) should work 3 or so times and reset every two or so days.
If you have not played recently there appears to be a warm up period but this is not consistent.

This system does not touch the back-end at all, it just behaves exactly as one of the regular crates would, except that it continuously generates new special contents buttons and alternates between strong and weak signal. That is all. If you grab regular crates they will count against the drops this provides, and if you use this it counts against regular crate drops.

does this still work? i placed it down and press the button and it gives the popup, i press ok but get no item

If the script is running it should only dump excess materials. (it may start with excess materials as it is updated in creative) it controls its own levels. Feeding them back in is fine until the cargo overflows, at which point parts drop into the mechanism because the grinder can move them to inventory. If they don't slip out the bottom they can build up, jam the rotor and.. Klang.

This happens in creative because grinder grabs parts from what it grinds down as normal, but welders don't pull parts from inventory. So it becomes an endless replicator quickly overflowing cargo capacity.

Once cargo is full the grinder drops parts in world and keeps doing so unless the lith dumps inventory somehow, so rather than letting them drop into the mechanism it dumps whatever it has too much of in inventory out the rear connector.

Rotor jam issues can be bad...
https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1957218930

Yea, I wasnt implying it should be/could be fixed. I just mentioned that it became a bit random with the patch.

But the RessourceOutput is actually interesting, never thought about it producing endless waste in Creative. I actually wondered why its designed that way, I replaced the connectors with a Conveyor to feed the stuff back into it. (But I also dont play on Creative)

Anyhow, thanks for this cool Blueprint, and for maintaining it.

huh and first time running SE on my computer since replacing literally 80% of it after hardware failure... SE runs really smooth now ^.^
So much better than trying to run it on Ubuntu at least ^.^;

And I have popped in to check on things.
All I can see is... it still works just fine... again, you need script to be running for it to work. if you leave it running in creative mode it will produce endless resources which it will have to drop out of itself one way or another (or it explodes! ^.^)
The powering down issue is built into SE itself. There is nothing I can do about it without increasing complexity massively. The power down issue should only happen once after each world load and to fix it you just need to toggle the batteries and ideally the solars off and on again.
That issue is just baked into the way the special content buttons work. There is nothing I can do to change that. Just be glad it isn't so easily weaponized to power down any grid regardless of access or permissions any more >.>