Space Engineers - "Open" Changes Everything
- Thread starter Old Duck
- Start date
Dare I ask for details?
see edit above
If I die to pirates after all this hard work.... Well I might have to go back to "easy mode" by starting on earth. I'm nowhere near combat ready! I was hoping being in a group of asteroids would protect me (keep me out of shipping lanes), but apparently not.. Maybe this is why people say starting in space is hard!
I know it's bad form, but I'm hoping pirates won't attack while I'm logged out.
UPDATE - I logged back in and he's still there!!! He's just sitting right outside of weapon's range, not going anywhere.. I'm just going to stay logged out for awhile, maybe he'll get tired and go away. While it says "freighter", the guy is loaded with guns that could turn my new starbase into scrap. This is more stressful than "Harry", lol!
UPDATE 2 - He's not attacking as long as I'm hiding in my pod, so I may call for help later when the PvE players are logged in. They could come and destroy him so I can keep my station.
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"Work Smarter, not Harder"
This is what I do at work, and what I try to teach to new hires that I mentor. So why do I insist on doing things the hard way while playing games?
Because I'm a gaming masochist, that's why.
Seriously, though... I spent most of my spare brain cycles at work yesterday trying to imagine how things like construction vehicles and a crane-like construction tower would work, when all I really need to do is something like this:
I did the assembler by hand, unfortunately. The nice thing about this configuration is that it will automatically install parts as their built, including the gold requiring superconductors, the instant it's assembled. That means as I feed it gold, it'll automatically increase the yield of the next batch to be processed. I started feeding it gold as quick as I could in the limited time I had last night. When I logged out, it had five tons of ore to process, and the bottom yield module was at 3/20 Superconductors.
The screenshot was taken this morning when I went to check up on my work. The bottom one is done, the next one up is at 13/20, and all the ore was processed. This is really going to change how I design and build structures in the future. I’d still love to build a vehicle that can 3D print a building, but I can take advantage of this method much more quickly, simply by including conveyor access points at strategic locations.
So many ideas, so little time to implement them.
also, there were a lot of sandstorms last night...
... it made navigating obstacles while flying... interesting.
This is what I do at work, and what I try to teach to new hires that I mentor. So why do I insist on doing things the hard way while playing games?
Because I'm a gaming masochist, that's why.
Seriously, though... I spent most of my spare brain cycles at work yesterday trying to imagine how things like construction vehicles and a crane-like construction tower would work, when all I really need to do is something like this:
I did the assembler by hand, unfortunately. The nice thing about this configuration is that it will automatically install parts as their built, including the gold requiring superconductors, the instant it's assembled. That means as I feed it gold, it'll automatically increase the yield of the next batch to be processed. I started feeding it gold as quick as I could in the limited time I had last night. When I logged out, it had five tons of ore to process, and the bottom yield module was at 3/20 Superconductors.
The screenshot was taken this morning when I went to check up on my work. The bottom one is done, the next one up is at 13/20, and all the ore was processed. This is really going to change how I design and build structures in the future. I’d still love to build a vehicle that can 3D print a building, but I can take advantage of this method much more quickly, simply by including conveyor access points at strategic locations.
So many ideas, so little time to implement them.
also, there were a lot of sandstorms last night...
... it made navigating obstacles while flying... interesting.
I wonder why, it’s not like, there’s space nomads out there, who look at other ships as if they’re a pile of spare parts... oh, wait!
WAIT WAIT WAIT WAIT!!!!I wonder why, it’s not like, there’s space nomads out there, who look at other ships as if they’re a pile of spare parts... oh, wait!
I found out what happened to the space pirate - HE CRASHED!! (Image at max camera zoom thus low quality)
My worst nightmare has turned into a dream! If I can salvage this ship, I should have most of the materials I need to build my beloved deep-space explorer (sans FSD). Speaking of spare parts!
UPDATE
I have now determined that when the ship was just "sitting there", it wasn't patiently waiting for me, it had already crashed. When it disappeared, it actually didn't, but instead it ran out of power, perhaps trying to free itself from the rock. This disabled the transponder, as well as the defense turrets. It's now mine to salvage!
ps - had it come just 100 meters closer, it might have destroyed my station. Amazing how close this great luck was to being terrible luck!
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This game can be ridiculously addictive at times. I had a series running on my iPad while I was playing on Saturday, and the next thing I knew, the screen was dark. I’m going to have to rewatch it at a later date, because I don’t remember a thing.
NOTICE - As detailed in my "SECOND LIFE" post above, I've started over on a new server stranded in deep space.
What started off as a terrifying ended as a great boon - a NPC pirate came dangerously close to my undefended starbase (see below), and I thought for sure I was about to lose everything. But miraculously he lost control of his ship and crashed into a nearby asteroid instead. Notice the structure to my right - that's my station. Compare this to the distance of the crash - just 100m outside turret range!
Worried that the pirate ship's defenses were still online, I got as close as I could and then tunneled through the rock to approach the ship in safety.
Thankfully the ship had depleted its power while I was offline, and so I was able to bring in my "Swiss Army Knife" and cut up this lovely ship for salvage.
This ship had a ton of ion thrusters (which are built using the ultra-rare platinum element), an intact reactor, cryopod, and other goodies. It took quite some time to cut it up, and my welder assembly kept pushing the ship around in the zero-G environment, bouncing it off the asteroid and damaging it. So I built a primitive "lo-jack" to hold it in place.
Unfortunately the sun had gone down behind the asteroid, so most of my work took place in the dark. Later when I logged in again, it was daytime and I got the following screenshot of the remaining salvage.
Unfortunately the server will eventually remove unpowered floating grids in order to prevent debris from bogging down the server - literal garbage collection! This ship had remained on the server all day while I was logged off, so I thought I was safe, but apparently "powered" means an active power source, even if that power source is empty - like an empty reactor or discharged battery. After I salvaged the reactor and logged of, the ship despawned while I was gone.... Rats! But at least I got a TON of materials from the ship before this happened. In the future I will make sure the save the reactor / battery as the last thing to salvage.
So now I have all the materials I need to begin printing a proper starship. Despite my explorer ship from the old server looking like a flying shoe box, I still very much like it. I do plan to make some adjustments to it in creative before assembling it on the new server. It will literally take all day for my factory to assemble the superconductors needed to build the frame shift drive, so I'll let that continue on the server while I do some work in creative. Hopefully in another couple of days I'll have an FTL spaceship on this new server and I can finally travel back to the homeworlds to visit folk.
I leave you with this picture of my starbase as of this morning:
What started off as a terrifying ended as a great boon - a NPC pirate came dangerously close to my undefended starbase (see below), and I thought for sure I was about to lose everything. But miraculously he lost control of his ship and crashed into a nearby asteroid instead. Notice the structure to my right - that's my station. Compare this to the distance of the crash - just 100m outside turret range!
Worried that the pirate ship's defenses were still online, I got as close as I could and then tunneled through the rock to approach the ship in safety.
Thankfully the ship had depleted its power while I was offline, and so I was able to bring in my "Swiss Army Knife" and cut up this lovely ship for salvage.
This ship had a ton of ion thrusters (which are built using the ultra-rare platinum element), an intact reactor, cryopod, and other goodies. It took quite some time to cut it up, and my welder assembly kept pushing the ship around in the zero-G environment, bouncing it off the asteroid and damaging it. So I built a primitive "lo-jack" to hold it in place.
Unfortunately the sun had gone down behind the asteroid, so most of my work took place in the dark. Later when I logged in again, it was daytime and I got the following screenshot of the remaining salvage.
Unfortunately the server will eventually remove unpowered floating grids in order to prevent debris from bogging down the server - literal garbage collection! This ship had remained on the server all day while I was logged off, so I thought I was safe, but apparently "powered" means an active power source, even if that power source is empty - like an empty reactor or discharged battery. After I salvaged the reactor and logged of, the ship despawned while I was gone.... Rats! But at least I got a TON of materials from the ship before this happened. In the future I will make sure the save the reactor / battery as the last thing to salvage.
So now I have all the materials I need to begin printing a proper starship. Despite my explorer ship from the old server looking like a flying shoe box, I still very much like it. I do plan to make some adjustments to it in creative before assembling it on the new server. It will literally take all day for my factory to assemble the superconductors needed to build the frame shift drive, so I'll let that continue on the server while I do some work in creative. Hopefully in another couple of days I'll have an FTL spaceship on this new server and I can finally travel back to the homeworlds to visit folk.
I leave you with this picture of my starbase as of this morning:
I have to admit, I'm loving the fact that I can leave my base to do things while I'm offline. Yesterday, my theme song was this:
Source: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ytWz0qVvBZ0
I just can’t resist this song whenever I mine.
After “leveling up” my Dragonfly to its full mining configuration, I spent as much time as I could feeding my refinery gold ore as fast as possible. As I waited for the first load to unload, I moved my welder higher so that the last yield module would weld. The second unload I spent installing a power efficiency boost to my assembler, and redoing the plumbing (I should’ve
By the time came to log out for the night, the second yield module was complete, and I think I had eight tons of gold ore left unprocessed. I ordered up the rest of the assembler’s boosts, and called it a night.
I got up this morning a little early, and I couldn’t resist sneaking a peak at my progress.
The last yield module was done, and there was 2.4 kg of gold remaining from last night's load. I moved the welder, placed the assembler’s boosts, and as soon as I turned it on, they popped quickly into existence.
The plan for the near future is to start building my base... or more accurately, splitting my time between mining gold on the server, setting up the necessary infrastructure, and prototyping in creative. I already have a garage design I’m happy with, and a 3D (small) ship printer... which are the two most complex parts of my base. What remains is much simpler in comparison.
I just can’t resist this song whenever I mine.
After “leveling up” my Dragonfly to its full mining configuration, I spent as much time as I could feeding my refinery gold ore as fast as possible. As I waited for the first load to unload, I moved my welder higher so that the last yield module would weld. The second unload I spent installing a power efficiency boost to my assembler, and redoing the plumbing (I should’ve
By the time came to log out for the night, the second yield module was complete, and I think I had eight tons of gold ore left unprocessed. I ordered up the rest of the assembler’s boosts, and called it a night.
I got up this morning a little early, and I couldn’t resist sneaking a peak at my progress.
The last yield module was done, and there was 2.4 kg of gold remaining from last night's load. I moved the welder, placed the assembler’s boosts, and as soon as I turned it on, they popped quickly into existence.
The plan for the near future is to start building my base... or more accurately, splitting my time between mining gold on the server, setting up the necessary infrastructure, and prototyping in creative. I already have a garage design I’m happy with, and a 3D (small) ship printer... which are the two most complex parts of my base. What remains is much simpler in comparison.
DLCs are mostly cosmetic, not necessary at all. I ended up grabbing them all because each one has a couple nice things - be it camouflage paint or nice railing and catwalks. SE DLC is kinda like ship kits and paint in ED. You also get some special story-based missions as part of DLC.
My new favorite server is down, which surprises me, but unlike Keen the admins of this private server care about such things and are probably working hard right now to fix whatever is wrong.
In the meantime, I've been modifying my exploration miner in creative mode to allow it to land on atmospheric planets. This involves adding some atmospheric thrusters and shaving off as much weight as I can. Since the new server is primarily a PvE server (the last was pure PvP), I don't need as much heavy armor for a non-combat ship like this. So while I've added more components (those thrusters aren't light), the ship is actually lighter overall because I replaced most of the heavy armor with light armor, save the "spine" and the bridge. I still need to be able to fend off Space Pirate drones should one catch me unawares!
In the meantime, I've been modifying my exploration miner in creative mode to allow it to land on atmospheric planets. This involves adding some atmospheric thrusters and shaving off as much weight as I can. Since the new server is primarily a PvE server (the last was pure PvP), I don't need as much heavy armor for a non-combat ship like this. So while I've added more components (those thrusters aren't light), the ship is actually lighter overall because I replaced most of the heavy armor with light armor, save the "spine" and the bridge. I still need to be able to fend off Space Pirate drones should one catch me unawares!
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Last night's adventure was brought to you by the Triple Face Palm:
When I finally got a chance to log in last night, I discovered that not only had my cryo-pod failed to preserve my life while online... again... but my base's survival kit wasn't an option for respawn! So I did what came naturally, and respawned in a drop pod, with the intent of scraping together a small ship, and flying it back to base... only it dropped me half way across the planet. I decided to try again for somewhere closer... only to spawn further away. I was going to try a third time, when the admin online was kind enough to rescue me, allowing me to spawn back at my base.
There was a bit of speculation in the chat that my base had been struck by lightning, and that had severed my survival kit's connection to my base. I didn't think it was likely, given that the desert biome shouldn't have thunderstorms. I also thought losing power wasn't likely, because I had two batteries installed, and my wind turbine could handle my base's power needs while it was idle.
It turned out that my base's idle power needs had exceeded that wind turbine's typical output by 50kW.
Thankfully, the admin was kind enough to fully charge my base's batteries, so I had the power necessary to fix this situation. I added a second windmill to my base, and then, just in case, started to add a decoy decoy block under some armor as a lightning rod. And that's when the second snag of the evening struck home. I'd built my sole vehicle from my respawn pod, and when I spawned another, it deleted the first! And while I had plenty of iron, I was short on cobalt. I was also short on silicon, which I would soon discover, much to my consternation.
Thankfully, there were nearby sources for both, so I iron manned it over and schlepped the stuff old-school. The lightning rod was soon installed.
I then proceeded with my original project for the evening: I wanted to install my base's 3D small grid ship printer/repair station. I'd wanted to scrap my current Dragonfly, which was more than a bit of a hodge-podge... not to mention it was considered a respawn ship... and replace it with a sleeker, new and improved version. I’d built most of the core components already, which was root cause of the power drain, and building that ship by hand again felt... tedious. I stayed up a bit later than I intended, to deliver one last load of silicon
I woke up early this morning again, anxious about my character, and wanting to take a screen shot of the finished printer. I also wanted to order a mess of parts to build my new Dragonfly... assuming my batteries were at full. That’s when I discovered, as that ancient mallard wrote above, that the server was down.
In retrospect, I have mixed feelings about not rescuing myself. On the one hand, it could’ve been an interesting adventure. On the other hand, I really wanted to give my 3D printer a trial run, and I wasn’t in the mood to hand build another ship.
When I finally got a chance to log in last night, I discovered that not only had my cryo-pod failed to preserve my life while online... again... but my base's survival kit wasn't an option for respawn! So I did what came naturally, and respawned in a drop pod, with the intent of scraping together a small ship, and flying it back to base... only it dropped me half way across the planet. I decided to try again for somewhere closer... only to spawn further away. I was going to try a third time, when the admin online was kind enough to rescue me, allowing me to spawn back at my base.
There was a bit of speculation in the chat that my base had been struck by lightning, and that had severed my survival kit's connection to my base. I didn't think it was likely, given that the desert biome shouldn't have thunderstorms. I also thought losing power wasn't likely, because I had two batteries installed, and my wind turbine could handle my base's power needs while it was idle.
It turned out that my base's idle power needs had exceeded that wind turbine's typical output by 50kW.
Thankfully, the admin was kind enough to fully charge my base's batteries, so I had the power necessary to fix this situation. I added a second windmill to my base, and then, just in case, started to add a decoy decoy block under some armor as a lightning rod. And that's when the second snag of the evening struck home. I'd built my sole vehicle from my respawn pod, and when I spawned another, it deleted the first! And while I had plenty of iron, I was short on cobalt. I was also short on silicon, which I would soon discover, much to my consternation.
Thankfully, there were nearby sources for both, so I iron manned it over and schlepped the stuff old-school. The lightning rod was soon installed.
I then proceeded with my original project for the evening: I wanted to install my base's 3D small grid ship printer/repair station. I'd wanted to scrap my current Dragonfly, which was more than a bit of a hodge-podge... not to mention it was considered a respawn ship... and replace it with a sleeker, new and improved version. I’d built most of the core components already, which was root cause of the power drain, and building that ship by hand again felt... tedious. I stayed up a bit later than I intended, to deliver one last load of silicon
I woke up early this morning again, anxious about my character, and wanting to take a screen shot of the finished printer. I also wanted to order a mess of parts to build my new Dragonfly... assuming my batteries were at full. That’s when I discovered, as that ancient mallard wrote above, that the server was down.
In retrospect, I have mixed feelings about not rescuing myself. On the one hand, it could’ve been an interesting adventure. On the other hand, I really wanted to give my 3D printer a trial run, and I wasn’t in the mood to hand build another ship.
Okay, I'm glad it's not just me. Casey says sometimes updates from Keen breaks things, and when this happens the server is usually down 24 hours top. Unlike Keen servers, the admins "eat their own dog food" (ie - they play their own server on a daily basis), so I'm not too worried. Like you, I had hoped to get some work done this morning, including feeding my refineries for a day of ore processing while I do IRL things, but I guess that will have to wait.That’s when I discovered, as that ancient mallard wrote above, that the server was down.
I suspect had you known it was "PEBCAK" (no offense, we've all been there) rather than a server glitch, you would have chosen the more challenging path. Something I noticed with this server is that it seems to do a much better job at maintaining our grids while we are offline. For example, my solar trackers continue to work even when I'm offline, something that doesn't happen on the Keen server. I suspect this means I could have drilling happening while I'm offline as well, again something that just "stops" on Keen's server (I tried it on CA#1). This is different than signal sources or a refinery, since solar trackers and drills rely on actual mechanical processes - rotors spinning, pistons extending, and in your case, windmills spinning. Even NPC ships remain spawned when I go offline, as I discovered when that pirate ship strayed into my waters. I like this, but it also means we all have to be a little more diligent.
Looks like server crashed and the work I did last night was "undone"... I'm not overly happy about that. I'm waiting to learn why this happened.
UPDATE - Casey (the admin) is on the scene and allowing us to use creative tools to restore any work we lost. Gotta love the TLC of a private server!
UPDATE - Casey (the admin) is on the scene and allowing us to use creative tools to restore any work we lost. Gotta love the TLC of a private server!
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Thanks for the heads up. Just got home, and it looks like I get a do over on last night's crisis. This time I'm going to cludge together a ship from the survival pod that'll hopefully see me home. I was grateful for the rescue at the time, but now I feel cheated on an interesting adventure.Looks like server crashed and the work I did last night was "undone"... I'm not overly happy about that. I'm waiting to learn why this happened.
UPDATE - Casey (the admin) is on the scene and allowing us to use creative tools to restore any work we lost. Gotta love the TLC of a private server!
Absolved. I'd rather read about some progress not constant setbacks. I'm here for entertainment. I just wonder what you put in there that drew so much juice.....
In retrospect, I have mixed feelings about not rescuing myself. On the one hand, it could’ve been an interesting adventure. On the other hand, I really wanted to give my 3D printer a trial run, and I wasn’t in the mood to hand build another ship.
Last night I got to use my new 3D printing system. It's a very simple and "hands-on" version, but I like having active involvement in constructing large ships. Someday when I'm building throw-away fighters by the dozen, that can be fully automated. As you can see by the image below, I'm using my starter ship to pull the projected blueprint through the welding assembly to create the real thing.
It kinda reminds me of this freaky movie (warning - image may disturb some readers):
It's not a perfect system, as some parts can't be welded until supporting infrastructure is in place. For example, hydrogen thrusters can't be welded until the tank is welded, but by the time the tank is welded, then the thrusters are too far from the welder. But this isn't a big deal because I can just slide the mostly-finished ship sideways across the welding assembly to finish the job. If I were mass-producing a ship from a welder like this, I would add "casting framework" to allow things like the aforementioned thrusters to be welded before the tank, using simple half-blocks that I'd later quickly cut away by hand.
Here's a picture of the half-assembled ship with the projector turned off. I like to stop and inspect every so many layers in case something doesn't finish. As I suspected, I ran out of certain components mid-build and had to assemble more before proceeding.
Kinda reminds me of this, but on a smaller scale!
I did learn one very important lesson - do NOT use the starter ship as the "mother" for a new ship, because then the new ship is flagged as a respawn ship! Thankfully after much fussing, the server admin helped me fix this issue. My next job is to grind up that starter ship for scrap!
I'm so glad to have my tried and true explorer / miner back in service. I've made some adjustments that I will eventually need to test (@Darkfyre99 I will need your help again), but right now I'm in a very resource-rich area, so I'm not ready to head to the core worlds just yet. I've got to resupply my starbase before I start my long journey back. Then I will rebuild my new combat ship (there be pirates everywhere), and then I will likely use this extra PCU to rebuild a much larger and livable starbase / shipyard. Lots to keep me busy, that's for sure!
It kinda reminds me of this freaky movie (warning - image may disturb some readers):
It's not a perfect system, as some parts can't be welded until supporting infrastructure is in place. For example, hydrogen thrusters can't be welded until the tank is welded, but by the time the tank is welded, then the thrusters are too far from the welder. But this isn't a big deal because I can just slide the mostly-finished ship sideways across the welding assembly to finish the job. If I were mass-producing a ship from a welder like this, I would add "casting framework" to allow things like the aforementioned thrusters to be welded before the tank, using simple half-blocks that I'd later quickly cut away by hand.
Here's a picture of the half-assembled ship with the projector turned off. I like to stop and inspect every so many layers in case something doesn't finish. As I suspected, I ran out of certain components mid-build and had to assemble more before proceeding.
Kinda reminds me of this, but on a smaller scale!
I did learn one very important lesson - do NOT use the starter ship as the "mother" for a new ship, because then the new ship is flagged as a respawn ship! Thankfully after much fussing, the server admin helped me fix this issue. My next job is to grind up that starter ship for scrap!
I'm so glad to have my tried and true explorer / miner back in service. I've made some adjustments that I will eventually need to test (@Darkfyre99 I will need your help again), but right now I'm in a very resource-rich area, so I'm not ready to head to the core worlds just yet. I've got to resupply my starbase before I start my long journey back. Then I will rebuild my new combat ship (there be pirates everywhere), and then I will likely use this extra PCU to rebuild a much larger and livable starbase / shipyard. Lots to keep me busy, that's for sure!