Ostranauts

Ostranauts

65 ratings
How to kill with kindness and violence. Updated for 0.12
By Tumskunde
Or how to get rid of your Enemies, either by making them Friends or straight up Killing them and getting away with it.
Bonus: How to steal their stuff, and where to find the good stuff on OKLG.
Double Bonus: Where to put their stuff and how to not die when salvaging a wreck.
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The initial Contacts
Now I'm only just getting started in this wonderful world, but there's some stuff that hasn't been explained, figured I'd clarify what I can. Game's still in the works, so this'll probably change in time.

So you finished making your character.
Awesome, but you saw all those faces running down the right of the ticket as you filled out your work history? They are you Contacts. Be they your parents, friends, ex-lovers or enemies, these are those that are close to you and already have opinions about you, and you about them.


So let's look at them:

Friends are nice, you can ask them for help, maybe even get a leg up on recruiting a crew. Plus, just like real life, any law enforcement officers (LEO's) who is your Friend is less likely to shoot you first and ask questions over your cooling corpse.

Enemies are a different sort, they can jump you, make your life difficult or, if they are traders/fixers, have nothing to do with you. I've also had LEO Enemies are the worst, they tack on extra fines and I've had a few start a fight that branded me a Public Enemy, which caused the rest of the LEO's to dogpile me.


There are also a few other relationships.

Contacts are more of a business relationship than a friendship one, one that lets you access certain options, like the Black Market, without needing to be friends with you.

(Ex) Lovers are easier to get to do things for you than friends, they seen them have a few more interaction options than regular Friends.

The rest of the people you meet are Strangers and once you know them Acquaintances, though you can make them Friends, Enemies or corpses at you discretion.
Important Folk, until they die.
Out of all the npc's there are 2 on OKLG that you should get to know. There's 2 more for completeness and being food secure.

Note these are all randomly generated each game, so I'll go by their titles/functions rather than names. They are important, because they offer unique services and once gone, they either take months to be replaced or they are gone for good, I've yet to see them be replaced either way.


First is the Fixer, they are found in Mescaform.

Tucked away to the left side of the bar, they are your only way to access the Black Market, where you can buy weapons and sell expensive stuff like Reactors without needing a salvage license.
If you didn't get them as a Contact during character creation, best make them your Friend via the social menu I'll detail below, doubly so if you ended up as Enemies.
They have an unfortunate propensity to be jumped by any Management or LEO's that wander through there, the bulk of whom usually get generated as your Friends, Enemies and Contacts during Character creation.
The plus side is that if Management starts a fight, they get branded as a Public Enemy and you can cold clock them without the LEO's stepping in. But if a LEO gets involved, then you'd best kiss the Fixer goodbye. If they aren't killed, they will be hauled away, never to be seen again.
If you want to keep them safe, best bet is to lock the doors to Mescaform, and keep everyone out. There's still a chance of someone being spawned in there should you visit later, so you might want to save before travelling to Mecaform.


Second is the Port Authority Clerk, they are FUN.

The best, snappy dressers in unique coveralls to boot, they are found at the Port Authority in the Commercial district. They always start as Strangers, as far as I've seen. So make them your Friend/Lover for the benefits. Once there, if you manipulate their mood correctly, you'll unlock wonderful Gambits that will let you waive Docking Fees and the like. No one targets them so they are usually safe.


Final two I mentioned are the Bartenders at Mescaform and Commercial. These guys let you buy more food and various other refreshments. The one in Commercial is the one picked 90% of the time when you get an Enemy that's a Bartender.
They may also give a bit of a discount if they like you, but it's usually small popotos after you get going. I recommend staying on their good side mostly to have secure access to food should the Supplies counter go days/weeks/months without restocking any.
Factions, they make and break people and ships
These and the rest of the Npc's are usually a part of 4-5 factions on board OKLG.

Management - This is the 1% of KLEG, they have power and like to rub it in people's faces. Or at least, it seems that way. They've started the bulk of the fights I've seen on station, mostly when they come across a Criminal. I usually hunt them down as they usually carry some decent gear and I like having the Fixer around.

LEO's - The Breakerboys, Pinkertons, Corperate Goons. They have guns, can fine you without cause and if they decide to kill you, that's it. Keep them friendly if you can. Incredibly hard to kill normally, as they are almost always in black EVA suits and carry firearms, but not always.

Shipbreakers - This was you before you quit and went solo. They are your competition, they fly all the other salvage ships out there. Find a nice wreck, but when you get there, all the good bits are gone? That's these guys, that or micrometeorites. They also have a habit of picking up anything laying on the floor on station, even if you are in the middle of welding/repairing it.

Criminals - Technically the bad guys. The Fixer is a part of them, this is why they get jumped left, right and all between. Not necessarily bad guys, just those at odds with the Management. That said I've had Criminals report me to the LEO's, so don't expect them to be friendly.

Pirates - Not usually found on station at the start. They make up the bulk of the Muggers and ne'er-do-wells that inhabit the wrecks. You'll kill more than your fair share, but you could also accidentally recruited one to your crew while they mugged you, only to have them pasted by a micrometeorite not 10 in game minutes later.

Micrometeorites - I keep mentioning them, they aren't people, probably. They are rocks, bits of broken ships and other debris. Could be a frozen corpse, but they don't usually shatter hull-plate on a hit. Usually they are moving at a high Delta-v on a course much different than your own. They don't care who or what you are. They'll just hit you, blow a hole through you or what you're carrying (my poor Super Handy) or whoever you just talked to. A bloody nuisance that can easily turn you or anything else into a bloody smear.

The rest - Unaffiliated, these guys are where you can find good crew and bad, also seem to either be dirt poor or with crates of valuables just waiting for the picking.
Making friends, or how to be Social
Relationships in game are much like they are in real life. The way the system works, you have two parts of a relationship. What they think of you, and what you think of them. You can think someone is an Enemy, but they see you as a Friend.

How you change your relationships are with the Social actions you gain once selecting a person.
Social actions are not made equal, they often do different things to both you and your social target.

Now in the social side of things, you'd think that anything positive would let you make friends easier, right? Not really, they help to spice things up, and increases/decreases on your side help change your mood, and thus the actions available to you, but the most important actions will affect [Contact] and you want that to go up, as that is the only way your relationship really changes.

There is a tonne of options here, the most BASIC ones are available to everyone, the rest are dependant on skills and traits and your current set of moodlets.

If you are looking for crew, asking about their skills raises your Contact, but not theirs, but it does give you valuable info on them. Downside is that it tanks your Privacy. And so far, the only options that increase your Privacy in a conversation also hurt your Contact ratings, best to end the conversation with [Leave] and select yourself to [Cocoon] for a while.

As far as Traits go, they take everything into account. I was a Cruel character, but because I was also Shy, so I couldn't just Insult someone, and your temporary moodlets from having high or low social need fulfilled also have a hand here, both blocking options and opening them up.

The best option is usually [Ask what's up?] as a lead up and [Shoot the Breeze] for replies, but there are to more to pick from.
If you have a pack of cigarettes, you can [Offer Smoke], it also ups your Altruism and unlocks a string of good replies and options, downside is that you get a Nicotine Buzz that really doesn't do much at this stage, other than give you itchy eyes, later updates maybe that will change?

Not much else to say, other than, if you don't have an option to increase your [Contact] use an option that'll change one of your Moods to a new one, this usually opens up new options to choose from.
Doing any Crime takes Skill.
Now on to Crimes.

First of all, you'll need certain skills to pull off, or at least drastically speed up doing the various crimes, I'll list them below.

If you are going to do the softer Crimes, or heck any Crime, getting trained in Hacking is highly recommended, if not vital. Even if you aren't going to do Crimes, it's still one of the best utility skills and time savers in the game, bar none.

To actually Hack, you need a PDA on you, then just access the lock of a powered door (you can hard lock a door by removing power, but you might be able to pry it open still) or smart chest and select the option on the left and let it run (You can pause and it still runs), once the numbers stop, you have the code and can unlock or lock the door as you need, if you are going to be using the door a lot, might be worth jotting the code down otherwise you'll need to hack it again, these are all randomly set each game, but consistent within that play through.
Update since 0.12, it's now a crime to hack a door in front of someone, so keep out of sight while doing this, definitely recommend doing this paused too, so no one can sneak up on you.


You can get this wondrous skill during creation by spending 2 years studying (a poor option) or spending year and having an Adventure.
A couple of the Adventure events give Hacking, but the best is Crackdown (Fake an Alarm) as it also makes you a Genius and it's one of the two better options.
Occupational Hazard(Hack Engine) does the same and gives you a Criminal Contact, but there are better options there as (Jury Rig) nets you Mechanical Engineering/Brave/Coordinated and (Troubleshoot) is one of the only ways to get skilled in Piloting.
Daily Grind(Hacking) is just bad, avoid it. You just get Hacking a few components and a LEO Enemy.
Some of the other events also give a chance to get Hacking, but these ones were the only guaranteed ones.
Most of this was pulled from Tulkas' Guide, plus checking the interations & loot json files for the event rewards.
While it's RNG to get any event, you only spend a year doing so and can save several years of training and can unlock a bunch of unique skills and traits.


Now for the harder side of doing Crimes.

Get Hacking, full stop. The control and ease of access this offers is vital when you need to isolate someone.

Being Strong is highly recommended if you are going the Violent route, as is being trained in both Unarmed and Armed Melee. There's a bunch of Adventures that'll net you 1/2 of the way from Feeble to Strong and usually comes with one form of melee training and a couple other traits.
No Joke, this here is the most important bit about Combat in general:
Being just Feeble? Your Damage mod is 0.25. Strong raises it to 1.0 and each of the Melee training options add another 0.5. All told that puts you at 8x the damage output of a Feeble, untrained npc, and most npc's you'll come across are just that.

Being Tough is nice should things go south as you get hurt at roughly 2/3 the rate of someone who
is Fragile, but it's not vital if you manage to get the drop on someone.

Being Fit means you can beat the life out of someone for longer before getting winded, plus it lets you drag corpses longer before you slow down. Sometimes you have a prolonged combat, useful against Muggers and for lugging their stuff.

EVA Training is incredibly useful, as EVA suits are also a decent form of Armour and being trained in EVA prevents any penalties from using it as such. Plus it's useful when dealing with Wrecks later.
Crime and Punishment.
As for the Crimes themselves:

The first we'll go over Theft, which is surprisingly easy, and really doesn't have many penalties.
The next is a subset of Theft and has to do with stuff installed on station, Vandalism, this has penalties.
0.12 Update: Hacking a door on OKLG is now a crime, do it out of sight to not get caught.

The next is Murder, which definitely has penalties assigned to it.

There's a very minor Trespassing one, found in the Port Authority backroom, but it's the only one I've found so far.


Penalties

The most basic penalty is being branded an KLEG Public Enemy, this means Management and the LEO's will be after you, maybe not right away, but you're not safe on station being such. This status can lead to fines or hard labour, or having a LEO jump you and try and turn you into a corpse.

Fines hurt your pocketbook yes, Hard Labour? Your Debts grow, you could get injured and you make no money to top it off you age, which could rob you of your health and the fitness needed to shank someone. All things to be avoided.
Theft, Station Salvage and Vandalism
Theft is simple. You see something, pick it up and it's yours.

Taking what's laying loose about? You're good as long as it's not in the Port Authority Office, but I think that's actually a trespassing thing, plus all those lockers are empty.

In fact there is a tonne of extra bits to scrounge and salvage at the start, I'll note a few spots here:
-For all these check the white/grey/brown wall bins and storage lockers in each of the rooms, the loot is random, but can net you more tools/weapons/EVA gear.

Port Azikiwe
-Stepping out into the corridor, there's that conduit sitting there, you can install it to power the door and access the rack inside with a tac knife and welder, or...
-Head south into the shadows, on the right is a switch that powers on the door in front of you, then you can grab the crowbar inside and use it to pry open most unpowered doors and locked/damaged storage, best tool after your PDA.
-Speaking of unpowered doors, to the northwest of where you get the knife/welder is an unpowered door that leads to a small room with a couple of bottles of basic medications and a conduit to weld to power the door.
-The two smart crates north of the Licence counter, just hack the door and walk in, the crates themselves are unlocked. They usually just have parts and trash, but those are things you can sell and you get a crate for storing things.
-There's also a Loading Corridor to the west of the License Counter, two locked doors leading west opens to a room full of racks with spare parts in them, some are damaged, but can be pried open with a crowbar.
-Also watch for any fights breaking out near the Loading Corridor, as the bulk of your Contacts spawn here and Criminals and Management like to get into scuffles. You can strip anyone stunned and unconscious without penalty. It'll net you more gear to use or sell, and you can always drag your Enemy's unconscious bodies into the secondary airlock to finish them off.

Mescaform
-For all the many locked doors, there's only two spots with any real loot. The Center has a bunch of lockers, full of parts and you can find some nice items in the attached bedroom.
-The Bar itself has a lovely room with 4 storage crates, empty storage crates. But the Bedroom below can net you some much needed items, like Cargo/Harness Pants and maybe some extra tools.

Azikiwe Commercial
-To the west, there's 3 locked crates sitting just north of the bar. One is usually empty, another has food, Last one can net you something useful, or not. I found a Cutlass and a broken EVA suit last game.
-To the East, ignore the Port Authority, just trouble scrounging there, but instead head north, there is a room with a pair of planters. Attached to it, behind 3 locked doors is a pair of locked crates. It's RNG, but these usually have the good stuff. I've gotten guns, EVA suits, Katanas and even a Webber Welder.


Stealing something someone is carrying is either quick and simple or the opposite.

If someone is dragging something, like a Kompart Backpack, Smart Crate or the like, just get close to them and select the dragged item and choose Drop. Then you can pick it up and they'll look at you before shrugging and doing something else.

Now if you need something from their hands? Or even their pants? this is where things get tricky. Easiest option is to shadow them, wait until they get tired and lay down to sleep, then you can select them and strip them. Assuming there's enough room, you get what you want, plus their shoes. You can also strip any stunned or unconscious person, so if they are in a fight you can nick their stuff and let them get clobbered.
I'll go over the other option of getting their stuff in the Murder section, as that usually is a probable outcome of the more involved options of getting their stuff.

Before we go though, Vandalism.
Say you see that lovely... CO2 Scrubber on the north side of Port Azikiwe? Or the air pumps in the secondary airlock? Those nice lockers in the Loading Corridor? Or you want a Fridge for your ship from the Bar? All that's illegal to take, same with punching a hole in the hull and venting the atmosphere.
The trick here is to not get caught uninstalling them, you remember I told you to get hacking? Lock the door with you being the only one inside. No one seeing you doing the deed means no one can interrupt or report you for it. Simple as that.
Murder Time
Finally we get to Murder.

Have an Enemy you want gone? How about a random stranger walking past with some primo loot? The easiest option for both is to kill them and take their stuff, safest? Probably not. But definitely quickest.

A note here, I've yet to be called out for dragging a body through the station, be they dead or unconscious. Pulled them straight past a quartet of LEOs, no problems, no questions. But later updates? Maybe that'll change, so let's make a quick assumption here and help you would be killers get into... good body handling/disposal habits.

Now Murder takes three things, Location, Target, Ability and a Plan.
We went over the skills and traits needed above, I'll detail them again below, but there are ways for anyone to kill anyone else, it just might take some time to do so safely.
Location, Location, Location.
Location:

Here's where Hacking becomes King, period, full stop. You need a secluded area to do the deed, hacking door codes let you section off parts of the station quickly. You could reset the door codes, but that takes a lot of time, and is considered Vandalism if you're caught. Hacking only takes seconds, once started you can cheese the system by pausing the game and letting it run.

0.12 Update: Hacking is now a crime, don't get caught doing it, so stay out of sight and note down the door code if you want to lock it. Failing that, go inside, lock it and then factory rest the door and set it to your own code.

Still scout out the area, OKLG has loads of spots that you can lure someone to, just look for the locked door and you are gold, best spots will either have secondary locations/rooms to stash a body and in case you are making a trap, hull access to the outside to install a vent or a secondary room to install a turbo pump to drain the room of O2.

Once you've found your Kill Room(s), and it's recommended to find them on each area of OKLG, we can move onto the next steps.
Target, who you looking at?
Target:

Look at who you are trying to kill.

No really, are they a LEO? If so, you need to take special precautions, and it might be better biting bullets to befriend them instead. This is because even if you one shot them, LEO's seem to immediately flag you as a Public Enemy should you do anything to them directly.

Look at what they are wearing. Do they have an EVA suit? Not a Pressure suit, those are paper balloons, but proper EVA suits are armoured something fierce, so expect at least a bit of resistance. That said a good ambush can stun them long enough for you to take the suit.

Look at what they are holding. Are they armed? Even Crates can pack a punch if you let them get a swing or two in, also it lets you decide if it's worth it to really merc the Target or switch to charming them.

Last and most importantly, look at where are they from. Their Homeworld sets their base traits, someone from Earth-side is unlikely to be Feeble/Fragile and is going to put up a better fight than a KLEG born schmuck.
You can usually pick out basic traits, and if it's someone from your past, you'll usually have a lot more info right off the bat.
Ability, it's all in the wrist.
Ability:

Here's the meat and bones, quite literally.

I listed the skills/traits you need above, but I'll list them here again to save you from scrolling.
If you're going the Violent route, you need to be Strong and Trained to fight both Armed and Unarmed. Unless it's a crime of passion, don't bother otherwise, stick to the slow/smart option detailed later.
This is because a Strong person has 4 times the damage potential of a Feeble one, and each melee training adds another 2x to that. Considering you're trying to murder someone, you should always stack the fight in your favour, never accept even odds if you can help it. Heck with all 3, I've stunned and defeated EVA clad opponents without them getting a shot in.

Weapon:

You also need a weapon, scrounging should net you a tac knife and crowbar, of which the tac knife is usually the better choice. If you find a spear/cutlass/slugger/katana use that, they are better still.

Avoid using firearms, guns are bad. I mean it, they are terrible. They are loud, have a limited amount of ammo, and the most common ones are easily countered by an EVA suit, and I've seen them even fail to do anything to someone in a pressure suit, heck most of the LEO's do more damage using theirs to pistol-whip rather than shoot. Maybe a Shotgun does better, but I've yet to see one with ammo to test.
It's also hard to get training in Gunpowder weapons, plus there are some firearms that are considered Energy weapons, they require a skill which I haven't found training for yet, just on the LEO's skill lists, so you'll just miss more often and waste valuable ammunition, which you could have just sold. In fact, guns are usually a great value for their size when you go to sell them, and that's pretty much it.
The Plan, Quick and Dead.
The Plan:

First you need to get your Target to the right place.

To start, use a social action on your Target and run away before they can answer to lure them into your chosen Kill Room, go deep and remember to close and lock the door once they are in to keep them from getting away or having someone else walk in to interrupt you.

Many options here to start with, it's usually best just to open up on them from behind with a stab from the tac knife, as it seems to give extra penetration and give the blow a higher rate of piercing you target's defences and hopefully stunning them.

If you do stun them, strip them, you get their weapons and armour away and they become easier prey, plus even a damaged EVA suit is worth something and they are fairly easy to repair. If they aren't stunned I'll usually keep stabbing them until they are and then I strip them.

Once bare, you can just go to town on them, take your fancy, but switch it up every so often as the game seems to ignore the same move when used multiple times in a row.
Hopefully you've knocked them unconscious and can take your time finishing them off.
Afterwards, you can tuck their body into a corner.
Do this by selecting them and picking [Drag]. After dragging them over, you need to drop them from your inventory screen, the body will be in the drag/pull slot, from which you can then slap down onto the ground.
Personally I usually use the Bathrooms as a place to Kill, as you can separate a secondary target into one of the stalls and use the other to store bodies, that last stall, the one full of bodies will stay locked once I reopen the bathroom for use/more targets.


The Plan, Smart and Slow.
The "Smart" option is always available.

But, like most smart things, will take more time and planning. As an upside, it works on LEO's and you won't get caught.
This option is usually the Trap, and it requires some setting up and time to let other things kill your Target, like a lack of O2.
The planning here is more stringent, maybe you need to bring an air vent and vent the atmosphere after locking them in, this requires access to the outer hull. You could also use a Turbopump to drain the atmosphere into the next room.

Works wonders if they don't have an EVA Suit, Pressure suits add some time to wait, but they will quickly fill with CO2 and then your target will pass out. Then you can then strip them of their gear and let them die.

Make sure you let them suffocate fully though, getting stabbed could wake them up and start a brawl that could tear your suit or let a LEO mark you.

Proper EVA's make things both trickier and much more time consuming, you can either wait for them to get tired and go to sleep, which lets you strip them of their gear and finish them off at your leisure, or you can vent atmosphere and wait for their battery in their suit to run out, which makes it fill with CO2 and they pass out. The Battery will usually die before the O2 Bottle.
Speaking of, unless you're really good/lucky, you'll often be in the room with your target, so bring your own kit so you can breathe, preferably with spares.

Most important note here though, don't switch maps mid-kill with a Trap. The game might pressurise the room, or let them teleport out. I don't mean don't leave OKLG station though, I mean the part of OKLG you are on, this means staying at the Port/Mescaform/Commercial until your trap pays off, so bring something to do or find a bed to sleep in so you can set the time to 16x and let it run, or maybe you can make a new friend or lover.

You can also just strip them after they pass out and re-pressurise the room if you just want their stuff and don't want them dead.
Bonus! Storage, where to put what you just got.
Now lets have a talk about Storage

Gotta have a place to put all that loot after all.

There are multiple sizes of storage spots, some work better than most.
Not sure if there's a proper classification, but here's a rough size based ones


Small Pockets can hold handfuls of small parts, be they mechanical or electronic, stacks of food, drink pouches, scrap cloth, light clothing and shoes.

Most are only 1 slot big, but some clothing comes with bigger ones, your starter Coveralls usually only have a pair of 1x2 pockets, but some also come with 2 1x1 Breast pockets.
Better still are Cargo/Harness pants that are come with 2 1x2 and 2 2x2 pockets, the Harness pants also come with a 1x2 Clip Point. Best part is that you can access their inventory without putting them on, so toss them in your Tote and laugh as you pull out stacks of parts and food from one slot in a Tote or Toolbox.
Most shirts don't have any pockets, even the larger overshirts but the Duster Coat has 4 small pouches.

Clip points are usually small as well, but come in a 1x2 configuration and can only hold tools/helmets, not food or loose parts. They are usually found on Pressure and EVA suits, and notably Harness Pants.


Medium slots are next, these fit things like the larger parts, cables/flooring and smaller electronic installables. Plus bigger/heavier clothing like Coveralls and Cargo/Harness Pants and EVA Gear.

They are usually found in stuff like the terrible Horang Toolbox which take up 2 slots and give you 3 in return. There's the much better Halvorson Toolbox that takes 3 slots and gives you 8. Best are the Tote, of which you always start with one tucked into the rack with your pressure suit, they sport 9 medium spots and 1 small pouch while only taking up 1 slot in return. The king here is the Kompart Backpack which has a whopping 16 medium slots and 4 small pouches and still only takes up 1 slot.


Large slots after that, only found in the Rakow Smart Crates and some storage lockers. These let you fit Boxes and Bags inside to tesseract your storage further. The crates themselves are the largest handheld storage, and can't be stored in anything else, but they give you 9 of these large slots to play with. I usually have 2 of these, 1 with a Halvorson holding my tools, the other full of Totes and Komparts to store a tonne of extra gear/parts, often further stored inside Cargo/Harness Pants


There's a final storage size here, the XL slots found on the SuperHandy Truck, notable as you can store walls and most bigger items in. Nothing marked as Oversized or most of the larger storage units, but it still fits 16 items in a 3x3 space. Unfortunately, you don't have super-strength and have to drag these behind you in your dragging slot, but it comes with a speed improvement over dragging other items.


The main Oversized items that don't fit in a Super Handy are the Nav Station, the Reactor, the Reactor tanks, plus any 1x3 wall storage, some of the smaller ones and most racks of any size and your smart crates.


Side note here, Fluids.

Drink pouches are terrible 1 slot holding maybe a 2 stack of liquid for a single small slot.

Bottles not much better with two slots, though they seem bigger as the stacks of alcohol held is usually 4/7, water remains a 2 stack, uses the same single small slot as the drink pouches.

Then come the Flasks both 4L and 8L are huge by comparison, they are medium sized, so no fitting them in your pockets, but they hold 8 and 16 slots of liquid.

Now since you can stack a few of these, a pair of cargo pants full of drink pouches out classes a 4L flask by 50%, and one full of bottles outclasses an 8L one by the same 50%. That said it's one less layer of gear to dig through for a drink/wash.
Bonus: Wreck Etiquette
I see people getting killed all the time to things they could have avoided, while they are learning experiences for you (your character is dead after all), it's not always clear what went wrong, so I figure I'd give some pointers on how I do things.

1. Wear your EVA suit before you leave OKLG. If you don't have one you'd better get one, and I don't mean that paper thing plastic bag that's a pressure suit. Either luck out and start with one, find one in a crate, strip one off a sleeper, or peel it off a corpse. Doesn't matter if you need to fix it, parts are everywhere on station. But have it fixed before you leave, pair it with a helmet and stock it with a fresh battery, O2 Bottle and CO2 filter. Better yet, have a spare Battery and O2 Bottle handy if you can. Afterwards leave it on until you need to take a break to eat/drink/sleep, then either take a break in your pressurised cabin or head back to OKLG. This saves from having to deal with decompression when a floor/wall gets destroyed/uninstalled by accident or meteor.

2. Always start with a security sweep of whatever wreck you are salvaging.
2a. I mean it, always do a security sweep of the wreck your salvaging. No point getting carelessly merced by a Pirate. I usually do this with a weapon in one hand and a crate full of breaching tools ie: welder, cutter, drill/screwdriver and crowbar, and a bunch of work lamps.
2b. Fun fact, you can drop a lit work lamp and it'll sit there shining light while freeing up your hand to hold a blade or tool. You can also use them to mark choice bits to visit later.

3. Carry a spare Battery. You can usually restore a bit of power to get a lay of the land and open any doors that need opening.
3a. Now, unless you need them, it's always faster to scrap a damaged door instead repair it, and not by a small amount either.
3b. If there's a reactor, you should probably patch it up and take it with you at the end of the sweep, can't fit it in a Handy and it'll usually save you a trip.

4. After everything is open and clear, then you can wander around with 2 crates in each hand, pack them with Halvorsons full of tools (my Breaching crate pulls double duty here) and totes/packs full of pants that to fill with the smaller sundries, like bottles of alcohol or pills and a Super Handy to cherry pick the best bits of more portable equipment.

5. Always check Bins, Fridges and Sinks. I've found Fridges full of spare parts, a Bins with spare Webbers or Katanas and Sinks full of both types of alcohol.
5a. Speaking of Sinks, you can usually uninstall the ones on wrecks, and if you need to, you can still access the liquid inside by picking them up. I usually have a couple of empty Flasks incase I find a sink full of booze, and you will find them if you look for them. Sometimes, the sinks won't want to uninstall, and they are 2 tiles in size. Personally, I'd rather siphon off the hooch to sell than leave it behind.

6. Dropping off what's needed, you can repeat the process until you either fill your storage or get everything of value. If you have spares you can leave the bags full of sundries behind in your ship's storage and take fresh ones to fill with more loot.

7. Now this is me being extra prepared and redundant, before I leave I'll refill my repair lockers, these are ones I've set up on both sides of my ship, filled with walls, patches, flooring and cables, plus ones set aside with component parts, to fix damage cause by micro meteor impacts, over zealous cops who ram my ship and careless flying. They also have a spare O2 bottle, either for my suit when it runs low or so I can bash it open to quickly refill a patched compartment with something halfway breathable.

7a. Usually I do an initial build of my ship out of whatever parts I first find in adequate supply and then go back and replace them with Mobile Space Systems parts to cut down on ship weight, so I stock up on replacements whenever I can.

8. Offloading is easy, just set a Trade Zone in the Zones menu and you can access all the various forms of storage within from the Trading Kiosks without having to drag things over by hand.

9. Once you can afford one, always fly with a license, and most importantly, keep it on you. Don't rely on finding one in a wreck, or off a corpse. As an added benefit, you can make a little cash back selling old licenses if they are still even remotely valid. You get access tot he better store and the LEO's can be downright nasty without one.
16 Comments
Tumskunde  [author] 29 Jan @ 12:04am 
Haven't seen the new pods, as my last big stint with the game was back in 0.12.
As to your question, yes I believe there is.
There's a switchbox you can usually find in the supply counter in the north section of Mescaform, who's proper name escapes me for the moment, that lets you control items.
There are powered auto-vents and ways to lock/power-down doors that basically turn them into big walls, make sure to lock them first or they can be pried open, i'm just not sure if that can be done remotely.
You would need a set of doors to seal off your airlock as well, that way they can't just pop back through.
Another option would be to lock them into a room and pump in CO2 to poison them, you'd need to get them comfortable enough to take their helmet off first though.
Tough I'm unsure if the boarder AI is programmed to break down walls to escape.
Meridian 28 Jan @ 9:48pm 
The new cargo pods may be worth noting in the guide
otherwise question: is it possible to have a trap room for boarders? Exposed to atmosphere, looks like an airlock.
is there a switch system that could be used to make the outer door close, and trap the pirate / officer / so-on, and leave them trapped until EVA runs out?
James Finn 14 Jan @ 8:01am 
Alrighty, I'll keep at it then. Thank you much.
Tumskunde  [author] 13 Jan @ 6:04pm 
@James Finn
No real secret, if you start the game with a Criminal Contact, you are pre-vouched for and can skip wearing the Fixer down. It doesn't have to be the Fixer themselves, other criminals work too.
Focus on any social options that moves Contact upwards for them, every action can have an effect on you and your target, so if you don't see anything you can pick another option that'll cycle you towards a new set. As you go through the line of options your own social needs will fill and drain and give you more options, as can their replies, there's usually a final [Gambit?] option that'll unlock the shop after their Contact is high enough.
James Finn 13 Jan @ 4:49pm 
Sorry, what's the secret with the Fixer? Do I just have to do that dialogue chain with shooting the breeze and cigarettes? Because mine has a dialogue tag about needing someone to vouch for me before we trade.
Tumskunde  [author] 12 Jan, 2024 @ 6:00pm 
@Jackochainsaw
It's coded at a 20% chance. You can save-scum the transponder removal. I've successfully (re)moved many. When they were first introduced to the game, I not only moved mine, I successfully salvaged 2 more before I broke one and decided to figure out why that happened.

It's still a pain to save-scum, so I usually work around it until I have a final location to move it to.
Jackochainsaw 12 Jan, 2024 @ 4:46pm 
Never move the transponder! Don't even think about it. there is a 90% chance you'll damage it and you can't repair transponders once they have the damaged status. A replacement one costs upwards of 30K. Even on hulks you loot, leave it alone unless it is already damaged. If you plan to flip the hulk you are working on, you'll need that transponder. Just restore it and leave it alone, plan around it.
HorHorHor 30 Oct, 2023 @ 1:20pm 
Impressive, I learned a lot even though I wasn't planning on stealing and murdering people.
pgames-food 4 Aug, 2023 @ 1:16pm 
ah ok, btw i found a storage bay for sale, i think it was 18k (i'll have to make space to install one, but managed to make about 94k from selling a reactor + other items from latest salvaging run. after expenses and buying a 3rd super handy + some red toolboxes, and refills, and money owed, it went down to about 70k (might try to buy it while its available, instead of buying a derelict as the derelicts seen so far appear to look smaller than what i have turned my starter ship into :)
Tumskunde  [author] 4 Aug, 2023 @ 9:48am 
The Reserve bins will double the capacity of you handy for any items less than 2x2 in size.
Plus you can take them out and slap them on a wall to free up even more room.

I know, technically better to is to drag around a Storage Bay, it takes up a 2x3 area, has 18 slots (3x6), and will take the same items, but it tanks your speed more than a Handy will.
If you are looking to install one on your ship, it takes up 6 floor tiles and requires that all tiles around it, corners included, be bare flooring, when you install it that is, you can install walls and other kit around it afterwards, requires at least a 2 tile gap to install beside another one.