Space Engineers

[Starwhip]

Every single one I've gone after since they made the ship turrets hostile a few months back has killed me. Did you create a faction? Not belonging to a faction just might make a difference. Other than that I think you just got lucky.

Or it might be that I have an old version. My friend hasn't updated their steam lately and I've been playing it off of them.

What's this talk of programmable blocks?

[ghpstage]

Or it might be that I have an old version. My friend hasn't updated their steam lately and I've been playing it off of them.

What's this talk of programmable blocks?

Its a block that can control components on its grid using by running code scripts the player creates.

Highly dependent. I usually salvage what I can off my starting ship/platform and rush-build one of my trusty Armadillo drilling ships (was built before connectors worked and batteries where a thing and I still use it). That nixxes the tedium of hand-drilling. Next up is one of my Hacksaw grinders to help if I salvage anything. The ship is easily retrofitted with weapons to go capture stuff. That thing is then easily converted into a welder and I'm set on the initial. From there I usually get to work on a mobile factory ship, a mining support frigate if you will, and then heavy drilling operations, but once you get the small welder/grinder and a small driller up, you're set.

Pro tip: the only difference between a welder and a grinder on a small ship is a large tube and a motor. They're extremely interchangeable.

Thank you, but I am aware of all of this. However I still find it a bit tedious to have to drill and return ores manually agian and again though, even with a ship. I won't go capturing any cargo ships because doing so makes KSP's 48-7s engine look appallingly underpowered!

Even with a ship, mining can get boring, the return trips to dump ore are annoying, and flying the ship yourself prevents you from doing other things.

My plan is to reduce drilling down time spent returning to dump ore by having drills eject everything and collect it at base with a gravity funnel made from the rescue ship, and then to increasingly automate this mine-collect-refine process as fast as is feasible.

The system is simple enough that full automation of asteroid destruction would be fairly easy.

Cargo capacity limitations on the single collector intake and the indescriminate nature of drone mining will be the main obstacles to achieving it early, followed by low industrial capacity.

I suspect with a decent small or hollowed out asteroid, I might be able to partly automate very early indeed!

EDIT-

Didn't go as well as I initially planned.

Sensors have had the bejeebus nerfed out of them. They now take 6 trips to construct a single one on realistic with the astronaut and are probably an order of magnitude more expensive than the majority of small ship parts. An automation system wants 5 sensors, so your better off with a welder first....

Also, there was no nickel to be found in the nearest 3 large asteroid systems on infinite, high density.

Edited January 22, 2015 by ghpstage