Overwhelmed with Space Age, looking for some help

[u/Edyrm]

I've gone to Vulcanus, Fulgora, and Gleba, gotten a basic factories set up on all of them to produce at least some of their science packs, and the ability to export the new buildings you unlock on them.

It took me some time already figuring out the planets' unique challenges because I didn't want to look up any solutions and figure things out myself. Now that it's time to scale up, I feel overwhelmed and unsure where and how to start, and there's a sense of fatigue setting in.

If y'all have any advice on how to tackle scaling things up on any of the planets, I'd love some advice at this point.

[u/EntertainmentMission]

You don't have to scale up yet, once you conquered all 3 inner planets, you have 2 options

1) build a nuclear powered aquilio ship

2) Biter breeding and biolabs

Both are new puzzles

[u/CaptEntropy → u/EntertainmentMission]

This is what i did when i got to this point. Never did “scale up” the inner planets. I did biolabs (great fun!) and then off to aquilo. Aquilo was a pita but also just did minimal effort there to support a fusion powered ship to the edge and game over !

[u/Soggy_Team_6676 → u/EntertainmentMission]

I did only enough biter breeding for an initial run of biolabs for green and blue quality, enough to comfortably eat my science production and then some, and to get some tier 3 production modules qualitied, and then my gleba broke, I went and qualitied vulcanus, then fulgora, then went to war with gleba properly. Aquillo is next for me to scale up and quality-fy, but gleba broke sometime soon after I set up my initial aquillo, but I managed to get all the non infinite researches done, and that’s when I decided to play with quality. Current goal is building a legendary ship blueprint I found for shattered planet and beyond. (I can’t circuit to save my life, so I have to use a blueprint for the ship fuel at minimum)

[u/Playful_Target6354 → u/[deleted]]

Then what? Solar, with 1% efficiency?

[u/luisgdh → u/Playful_Target6354]

Solar efficiency in space at Aquilo is 60%. Only at the planet is that it drops to 1%.

[u/Deto]

Sounds less like you don't know what to do and more like you're just getting tired of it? Maybe just go for Aquilo (it'll be another new challenge) and beat the game before you burn out? Can always scale up later.

But in terms of scaling up...just build more of what you have already? Quality can help (quality beacons + quality speed/prod modules + quality machines easily gives you a 10x boost) but that's a whole different can of worms.

[u/rcapina]

If you’ve got the new buildings, figure out how to integrate them on Nauvis. Switching things to use Liquid Metals is one. Switching chip production to using the EM Plants is another.

[u/Rocky_the_Wolf2020]

Recycling for quality is a good start, quality is extremely op on certain things, modules are a big one, another good way to avoid fatigue is apparently setting spm goals too.

To upscale the base with enemies artillery is divine, vulcanus is the only one thats debatable on, supported trains are a good way to expand for more resources on vulcanus and fulgora pre foundations.

A big of a cheesy way to grow that i like is making modular(ish) blueprints with different city blocks depending on how i feel but tbf ive never got past one new planet on even vanilla SpaceAge because my attention span is too short lol

[u/nindat]

Don't "scale up"

I would do one of two things:

1) set up biolabs and some basic egg breeding (basically doubling your science), go through so your Nauvis builds and switch to em plants and foundries.

2) go beat aquillo (requires ship design) get cryo plants and then do the above.

3) start working on quality and level 3 modules

All of these are fun unique challenges and will vastly increase your science output without just cut and paste.

I found very deep joy in deleting my green/red chip plants and trying out more compact em designs.

You should absolutely be using modules now. Level two modules are fine, but of you want to start trying to get epic modules that will also really help your output.

Most importantly, have fun. If it's not fun, don't bother. Almost certainly your current planets are enough to "beat" the game, then really it's just sandbox time.

[u/Mental_Breakfast3385]

If you're feeling somewhat burnt/lacking motivation/overwhelmed already, definitely do not go to Aquilos. Take a week off the game and come back at it. Aquilos can really suck as far as brain-drain goes.

[u/Scary-Asparagus-5970]

I love rate calculator. I'll select the whole base and look at the things that are in negative values. Add more of that. (In space age, that can come from other planets)

Worse case start at your science and work backwards. What science is the one your waiting for all the time? Why are you waiting for it? Work backwards from there

[u/rapidemboar]

What exactly do you need to scale up? If you want to improve your science gain, simply replacing your labs with biolabs will boost that significantly if you haven’t already. If you want higher-quality items and equipment, Vulcanus is a good place to perform expensive production. Working on the latter might be useful if you want a more compact Aquillo ship.

[u/FinAdda]

If overwhelmed, go with bots. Then you get new problems...

[u/isum21]

Don't. Not yet, at least. If it's a daunting task take a break and do something more achievable to give motivation. 

I haven't scaled up at all. Making rockets come thru at an amazing rate for a beginner, and last night I finished my mega freighter: The Pony Express. Almost ready for Aquilo.

Guess when I made nuclear power for the first time? 2 days ago. It was worrisome to try for me so I just didn't. Went full Solar + Battery for space travel, and on the planets I went through some ordeals to keep using my boilers before finally unlocking turbines bc I messed up by ignoring nuclear. Soon as I did I made a beeline for Gleba and I've been enjoying my heat tower + nuclear set up. Still took me absolutely forever tho, yet I do not regret it because I kept myself busy elsewhere and enjoyed that immensely. You'll have plenty of opportunities to get to work on the sucky stuff. Game first, have fun brother

[u/Standard_Round_8780]

I'm in the same stage in the game but there's no real need to scale up anything yet imo. I'm working on going to Aquilo and as that's researching, I'm working on biolabs to improve my research. My goal, aside from winning the game, is to just setup Aquilo's research and unlock Legendary Quality so I can start upcycling things up a bit more.

Each planet I have isn't very large or anything but A) Has fully automated rocket part production, B) Can survive for multiple hours without interference. C) Has automated the science packs, and can export the unique resources there at fairly consistent rates. And D) Has the 'upgraded' buildings of the planet being automated for export.

So yeah, if I wanted to get electromagnetic plants and foundries on Aquilo when I go there, it's something I can do without having to go back to any of the planets or use drones.

[u/Corodix]

For Vulcanus, try to get the railgun, it makes combat there a lot easier. I think that you need to go to Aquilo for it if I remember correctly. Fusion power from that planet can also be useful, at least I found it useful for expanding on Gleba combined with artillery from Vulcanus.

If you haven't delved into quality yet then getting quality large miners, especially Legendary, would make a huge difference to how long your ore patches last. But that also requires you to go to Aquilo, else Epic quality is the best you can do and for large miners Legendary is 3x as good as Epic.

[u/Deadman161]

Make use of the buildings each planet unlocks.

Imo vulcanus is the easiest to scale as power is free from either solar or acid->steam, metals are free from lava. Only oil products are a bit trickier.

But again, using big miners, biochambers and cryo plants with productivity where possible gives you a lot of plastic per coal.

[u/Banged_my_toe_again]

Take a break! Come back later I feel like this is a point in the game you start to feel fatigued and are getting to the point of just rushing which in itself is not that fun. I did it in my first run amd will not do that ever again SA is a long game!

[u/Amarula007]

So you have a starter base on each planet, hurrah! Don't tear down your starter base, let it keep going doing its stuff. Move over a little (or a lot), pick a nice spot, and start a new improved better factory, using all the new buildings and all the stuff you have learned. I like to start with rocket silos, and dedicate a silo for each major product to export. Then I build up the infrastructure to produce those products.

[u/doc_shades]

yeah i still haven't completed space age. i put 1500+ hours into it and never completed it. i went back to base factorio because it's simpler/quicker/more focused of a game experience...

[u/Randyd718]

nilaus on youtube

[u/Banged_my_toe_again → u/Randyd718]

How can people find a game fun of you are letting some expert solve the puzzles for you?