Beginner guide

= Beginners Guide + FAQ (work in progress) =

Keys
- tab switches camera mode (First person = mode 1, moving camera = mode 2, fixed 3rd person camera = mode 3) - b enters/exits the build mode

When in normal mode:
Keyboard: - w/a/s/d moves your character in mode 1 and 3, and moves the camera in mode 2. The camera sticks on the relative position to your character when you switch from mode 2 to 3.

- space lets you jump. Keep it pressed to fly/hover your character.

- q lets you interact with different blocks when standing near and facing them, or let´s you switch between Land/water/flying mode of your vehicle when standing on a vehicle, but not near a usable block.

- t,g,z/y,h,u,j,i,k,l,o, move your vehicle (please look at the display, all buttons are listed there). Pressing the acceleration and deceleration button at the same time stops your vehicle.

- v opens a display with different information about your vehicle. Here you can also change various setups of your vehicle.

- y/z opens skill menu and inventory. Here you can add different weapons to your character and use skill points (which have no effect at the moment)

- m opens the map

- c opens the AI menu. Here you can switch the AI on your ships on and off.

- x opens the spawn menu for enemies (only in vehicle designer)

-o/p controlls spin/turn blocks and harpoons (winch them) under certain circumstances (not implemented fully yet)

mouse:

- first mouse button: Use item in your skillbar (press 1-9 to select the item after placing them in the item menu)

- second mouse button: use mellee attack (does 25 kinetic dmg)

- third mouse button: fires mounted guns which are in the selected fire group and can face where you are aiming (press caps lock to make the camera follow the last fired projectile /missile)

- mouse wheel selects firing group (default is "ALL")

When in build mode:
(vehicle control is still in effect as in normal mode)

Keyboard:

- w/a/s/d moves the block marker relative to the direction you are facing

- space moves the marker up/ alt moves it down

- b exits the build mode

- e lets you open the block inventory. Select which block to built here.

- r replaces the currently selected block with the block your marker is resting on (useful for fast switching between two kinds of blocks)

- holding shift lets you replace an already placed block with the kind of block you have currently selected (instead of deleting that block)

- f starts autofill. To use this feature you have to first build a closed shape and then place the marker inside of that shape so that the marker is right beside one of the marginal(surrounding) blocks. THen press f. If this doesn´t work move the camera a bit as you have to look "inside" your shape.

- n places a symetric marker. Everything you build/erase on one side of the marker gets mirrored on the other side (does not work with spinning blocks, turrets or auto fill)

Mouse: (this is for the standard building mode which cna be switched in the menu)

- First mouse button: places/removes a block at the position of the marker and moves the marker forward by one block (depending on where you look)

- second mouse button: places/removes a block at the position of the marker and moves the marker back by one block (depending on where you look)

-mouse wheel lets you zoom in and out from the marker (useful for building inside closed rooms)

A simple raft
For your first steps use the vehicle designer. Here you have infinite resources to test the different game mechanics.

First of all you´ll have to create vehicle. To do that press B to enter the building mode, then E to open the inventory. Now click on the "constructables" tap on the left and select "vehicle". Now just move the marker somewhere with enough space and click. Congrats, you have just spawned your first vehicle.

But it is only a simple wood block now. We´re going to change that. Open the inventory again (E) and go to the "Blocks" tap and select the wood-block. Now move the marker next to the existing wood block (it should turn green) and click to add the block (or hold the mouse button to place a line of blocks). Try to create a platform that is 5 blocks wide and 10 blocks long. Notice that the arrow in your marker shows towards the front of your vehicle. This is important so the AI knows in which direction the propulsion should work. You can make the platform more stable by making it wider.

To make things faster you can press N with the marker over where the middle of your ship is supposed to be. This will place a small "wall" of particles. Everything you place on one side of the wall gets mirrored on the other side, making it easier to create symmetric ships. Another trick is the flood fill: Draw a closed shape with blocks in any of the three planes, move the marker inside it and press F. The game will flood fill the shape with the selected block. Good for creating huge walls or floors.

Now that you have a good basis for your ship it´s time to add blocks with a function to it. Most of these will use energy, so first thing you should build is an engine which provides energy for the whole ship and all of its systems. To do that first place an engine block from the "engines" tab somewhere in the middle of our raft. This is the core of all engines. Next, place a "crank shaft" block right in front of it. These will connect the engine to the cylinders. Now place a cylinder next to the crank shaft and a carburettor next to the cylinder. Lastly place a "engines own full tank" next to the carburettor. Alternatively you can place a "fuel storage tank" from the resources tab anywhere on the ship. This is however less effective and will cause your engine to use more fuel. If you've done everything right the energy bar in the HUD (lower left corner, with a lightning bolt) should be filled and red instead of grey.

You can add further blocks to your engine to make it stronger and/or more fuel effective. For further instructions on how the blocks interact with each other read the tooltips in the building menu.

Now the boat need some kind of propulsion. For that select the "boat propeller" block from the "water" tab and place it at the end of your vehicle. Next place a boat rudder uner your ship. Place it at the end or it will be less effective. If you place it at the front your left/right controls will be reversed. Now place a vehicle controller from the "control" tab and you´re good to go! switch back to normal mode (press B) and move your avatar next to the controller. Make sure you are in boat control mode (press q till a sailing boat appears in the upper right corner of the HUD). Now you can control you ship using U/J/H/K. As you accelerate the energy bar should go down as your propeller is using energy created by the engine. If you have used a fuel storage (the kind you can place anywhere) instead of an engines fuel storage you can also see how much fuel you have left.

Important: Press ESC and click "Save vehicle". Once saved you can spawn the vehicle endlessly in designer mode by using "load vehicle" (vehicle will spawn in front of the current camera position). This is important so you can continue you work later.

Now experiment with different kinds of engines and propulsions and come back when you are ready for more. Next up will be weapons and turrets.

Weapons and turrets:
I won´t be discussing simple weapons here since I think everyone should be able to figure them out by themself. If a lot of people should be having problems with them I´ll add a guide for them but I don´t think that would be necessary.

Missiles:
First I´ll start with custom missiles since those are the easiest to set up. Note that I only will tell you how to get a simple one starting, not explain all parts in detail. All parts can be found under the Missiles/Torpedoes/Mines section of the building menu

First of all you´ll need a missile controller and a missile lauchpad. The launchpad should be facing the direction you want the missiles to fire. Notice that you can either place them directly next to each other or connect them with "Missile 6 way connector" blocks. Any add-ons are connected to these connector blocks, too (for example the "staggered fire addon"). Then add "missile blocks" directly in front of the lauchpad. You can decide how big the missile is by placing a different number of these blocks. Each block has enough space for two missile components. When this is set up face the missile and press q (while outside build mode). If you´ve done everything correctly a new menu should pop up with the missiles "body" appearing on the left and a list of components on the right. A working missile needs to have at least the following three components: - thruster (rotor for torpedoes) (to make go anywhere) - fuel tank (without it the thruster won´t work) - a warhead (or it won´t do anything on impact)

A guided missile needs fins and a guiding system in addition to that.

To swap a component first select a component place on the left menu (the top ones are near the end of the missle while the button ones are the nose, so a guidance system needs to go into the most bottom one), then select the desired component on the right and click swap (you can also double click the component). If everything is set up correctly should should be able to fire the missile in the normal game now.

Frequently Asked Questions
Q. Are repair tentacles always on? A. Yes, but you can set them to not repair other constructables in the "V" menu where you can tick it to stop repairing other constructables