Star Sonata/Bases

Finalized Guide. Thanks to all that helped, pictures would be a little dull really. In memory of GrimSweeper's guide, which taught me how to make bases!

Any questions or requests should go on the talk-page.

Skills Required
Firstly, you will need the Station management skill.

Sol - 3, no requirement Free Market - 3, no requirement Prism 9, promethium x5 Absolution, 12, promethium x8 Handel's Cove 16, ariadnites x2 Ruby Steppes 16, Aqua Nuzzle Bioloquique 20, microbes amoruese x1

For level 1 you need 1sp, for level 2 you need 2sp, etc..

This level determines the level of bases, and thus the gear they can use:

Arcadian - tec 3 (Ares - tec 6 : not an official base type) Adonis - 9 Argonaut - 12 Ambrosia / Avalon - 14 Andaman - 16 Achilles - 18 Annilhilator - 20

The tec level of a base kit determines the tec level of all gear you can equip on it, barring blue prints.

Note that you will require the skill of an item to equip it. E.g. Equipping an adonis shield will require 9 in shielding.
 * Hint: It is possible to have team-mates / alts equip items for you.

Useful, but not necessary

Levels in Station Mastery, which will increase the survival rate of your base dramatically. This skill is available in Free Market, and increases the stats of your base by 5% / level. E.g. Station Mastery 5 gives a 25% boost to all stats (energy, elec, shield, recovery, capacity, range, damage, firing rate, radar). Maximum level is determined by your Station Management level. Skill cost is 5 points / level.


 * Hint: Certain base items, such as the Z extensors, require station mastery to equip.

Levels in Station Tweaking, which will increase aug efficiency. Each level increases augs by 2% / level. E.g. Level 8 will increase an aug by 16% - an ambrosia range augmenter (+53% range) will by increased by 16%, or +61% Important! Aug Tweak does not effect augs equipped onto bases.

Each station gear has a X, Y, Z level variant that can only be built using the previous stage as periodic material, and increases the stats by roughly 20% a stage. These come at a large size increase (e.g. 26k for Adonis Y) and are costly in materials.

Unusual kits - not only are there unique base kits (bellamarines, Iq'Bana) with their own advantages, but there are the following: fortified, laconia, dementium & adamantium kits. These kits have increasing levels of resists & more of them built into them.

Complicated station kits (only usable with Mastery) contain basic materials to allow building from scratch more easily. Usually these are metals, rations and workers.

Extraction Expert (EE) and Colonial Administrator (CA) will be discussed more fully under resource / colony management. However, they require Station Mastery (and Merchant for EE) - you can have twice the skill of your mastery, rounded up. E.g. With Station Mastery 7, you can have 15 in EE or CA. EE costs 5 points / level, CA 10.

Attached or un-attached base kit
Attached kits can only be laid on planets or moons. Unattached kits can be put in any clear space. Obviously, only attached kits can utilize planet / moon resources, and be mobile. Tec 16 kits are only available in hard to reach AI stations, tec levels above that can only be found in DGs.

Moons can only have one base, small planets three slots and large ones four.

To place an attached kit, you must target the planet / moon and be at its edge and use the base kit. To place an unattached kit, you must have a clear space.
 * Hint: You can tractor unattached bases after building onto suns, warps and so forth. You can also drag them onto stationary planets to prevent others building there.

Important! If you intend to set up a colony, note that whilst Extraction Expert (EE) is kept with "shared" planets for that base, Colonial Administrator is halved. CA colonies need to be stand alone to get the full benefits.

What are the limitations on laying bases?
The number of bases you can lay is determined by your Station Management skill, the tec level of the base, and any additional skills you have. I could explain the workings of it, but the Pantalones team have very kindly made a tool that calculates it for you:

External link: Base Slot Calculator

Use it to see how many bases you can lay - thanks to the Pants for that one!

Each system can have the following number of bases:

25 max bases per system 15 max bases per team 10 max bases per player

These are concurrent. E.g. You can only have 10 personal bases in a team owned system or unowned system.

Systems can only be owned if your team have a colony there and three minutes have passed. Only Officers or above can own / unown systems. Obviously, systems without planets to build colonies on can never be owned - you will also need to be part of a team (either personal or large) to do so. Owning a system prevents others from laying bases there.

You cannot lay a base in the following systems:
Systems with a Danger Factor of 10 or under, or 110 or over.

Special systems (through purple warps). E.g. Bonnet, Absolution. The there only two exceptions to this rule, one is found in the Nexus training area.

Systems owned (and Protected, more on that later) by other teams.

So.. what's the recommended minimum base kit to use?
Practically (and we'll discuss level protection later), NO base under Adonis has a decent survival rate, at least on its own versus AI. Even in low level DF systems, without Adonis gear, your base is vulnerable.

Players, on the other hand, are a much nastier lot, and require a lot more thought. You can find a discussion on this at the end of the guide.

Control
Here is the over-all control of the base:


 * Set name - what people see when they target the base
 * Set description - what will show in the general tab
 * Transfer money to ship - useful to take profits off
 * Add trade good - we'll discuss that later, you'll need a trade bay for this
 * Make team base - allows team mates to dock, and defenses to help each other
 * Transfer money to base - material processing requires credits
 * Docking privileges - either "me" (you only), team, or All. Bear in mind that your personal slaves cannot use a base set to "me". People attempting to dock without privileges will receive the "Docking denied, Please move along" message in their Events tab.

You can also see your shield, energy and capacity levels here. For advanced base construction, it is possible to power bases with lower level tec energies, but for now stick to entire sets. E.g. Adonis energy, shield, radar, laser.

The control tab also contains a history of the base, in terms of which ships have docked, what they have traded, if someone has unequipped / equipped items, taken / given credits and so forth. Unfortunately, if your base is open to All, regular AI tend to remove the history that you would want to see through constant docking / undocking.


 * Warning!: Bases require credits for second stage manufactured goods material processing (MRE space oats -> rations etc). You have to add this via the control tab. Items will state their credit costs in their item description.

Items
This is where the stuff that makes your base work is listed:

Required

Rations - to feed workers. Ration usage / hour can be checked in the possessions list. One worker uses 0.6 rations / hour. Workers will use rations in your ship's inventory, if you're in that ship. Thus you can feed a station whilst building it. '''Warning! Without rations, your workers will strike, and un-equip everything, leading to your base dying.''' Handy shorthand table (many thanks to ArrowHate for crunching the numbers):

10: 6/1h     - 144/Day 50: 30/1h    - 720/Day 100: 60/1h   - 1,440/Day 250: 150/1h  - 3,600/Day 1000: 600/1h - 14,400/Day


 * Hint: The hydroponics item will produce enough rations for 299 workers, with sufficient MRE factories. 

Workers - each item requires one worker to equip. You can check the numbers currently used in the control tab.

Space to fit items - station extensions, X, Y, Z versions and Mzungu transdims. Each gives a certain space bonus, and they are subject to both your merchant skill & capacity augs. Extensors Z require Station Mastery to equip.

Energy - to power everything else. Be ware that Adonis although not using nuclear fuel, produces it as waste. Thus space will fill up without attention.

Shield - to protect the base

Almost certainly useful

Trade bay - required for slaves / AI to trade at your base. Once you have a trade bay equipped, you will have another base tab, Trade. More on that later.

Radar - bases will not fire on attacking AI / players without a radar. They also won't fire if they can't see an attacking player.

Weapon - any number of weapons can be equipped, with differing damage types. The base AI will choose the most damaging weapon when targeting hostiles.

Nuclear waste - to power most base energies.

Augmenters - different base technologies can have different amounts of augmenters. For Adonis and above, this is four, for below this the amount lessens. There are special kits that allow more. You can use either normal augmenters (dependant on tec level) or base augs for bases. For now, just be aware of the possibility. Like ship augs, they cannot be unequipped.

Obviously, only attached bases can have extractors equipped and ONLY if the planet / moon has the resource. We'll look at this later, but unattached bases / those that lack the resources will require materials shipped in, either directly, or through slaves in the Trade tab.


 * Hint: If your system has neutral "hoover" type AI (for instance Chromatic Hues) they will trade with your base. Don't rely on this, but it is useful.

Construction
Initially this will only allow you to build a trading bay, and the lowest level extensors. To increase the list here, you must move a blueprint onto a base and "use" it (right click, use or double click on it) from the items tab. It will then appear here, with the material / credit requirements listed on the right. Initial requirements are needed on a base to start construction, periodics can be supplied later - you will receive a red warning notice in your events tab if construction has stopped, listing what you require. Most commonly this is a required commodity or credits.

Warning: If a construction has a credit requirement, be careful that it doesn't drain the base of credits, thus stopping second stage production, e.g. rations.

You can pause construction by selecting it and clicking "pause". Cancel will remove it. Important! You also lose any materials / credits used in the manufacture if you cancel a build.

Construction requires free workers! Be sure to have workers spare to construct items. You can check this in the control tab.

If you wish to calculate the time taken by a construction, multiply the number of manhours by 6. This gets you the number of minutes for one worker to complete the item. If there is a max number of workers allowed, then use it for the next part; otherwise just divide by the number of spare workers available on the base.

E.g. 10,000 manhours with 100 workers will take (10,000 x6 / 100) = 600 minutes, or 10 hours.

Once an item is finished, it will appear in the items tab. If there is not enough space, it will remain at 100% until enough space is made on the base.

Important: You require an equivalent or higher Station Management to equip prints. e.g. a tec 14 print will require SM 14. Other prints can have different requirements. e.g. A platform defence alpha print requires 1 in Drone Mastery to equip onto a base.


 * Hint: Sometimes construction will "burp" due to server crashes. If this happens, and construction appears stalled, try delivering all the commods required at once. This appears especially true for constructions that take a long time. 

Trade panel
Here you can add any number of things to buy and sell (including augmenters) from your base. To do so, the base must have had that item on it, however briefly. i.e. You cannot set a base to buy or sell an item that you've not physically had on a base of yours - and these are reset each universe.

To set a trade good, go to the Control panel, select "Add new trade good...", select the item and then set the Buy Price, Sell Price, Buy Max and Sell limit. If you do not wish to buy / sell an item, set the variables for that side to zero.

Example - wanting to sell rations to a colony for 10, and buy from a slave at 50.

Buy Price: 50 Sell Price: 10 Buy Max: 10,000 (the base will cease buying at 10k) Sell limit: 1,000 (the base will not sell to your colony if you have less than 1k rations)

Once a trade good has been added, it will appear in the relevant trade tab (e.g. if you add a DeathWarmedOver, it will appear in the weapons tab). You can modify your initial pricing etc by right clicking in here.


 * Hint: If an item isn't appearing on the "add trade good list", try un-docking and re-docking, the list will update. 

Important! Its a very good idea to set minimum levels on essential items such as rations and nuclear waste if you intend to open your base to all to prevent them being all bought, and the base destroyed. Trust me, it has happened to people... and its a very sneaky tactic.

How do I go about building a base? (Tutorial)
For now, we'll assume you're wanting to build a shop, using an unattached kit. First priority is to consider whether or not you will be using pre-made base gear. If you are not, you will need to defend the base until you have built a set of adonis gear.
 * Hint: Having people and drones around to clear AI when laying bases is very sensible! 

When building from pre-made materials you can use slaves to transport gear and set them to dock at the station. Just switch between ships as you would in an AI station.


 * Warning! If a base is destroyed, so are any ships not being piloted that are docked there! This applies to capping bases as well.

What you will need (bare minimum)

What to carry
Station Kit IV Ares Energy, Shield - a radar & weapon are useful, but not essential Rations 500 Metals 500 Workers 50 Blue Prints for Adonis Energy, shield, radar, laser. Extensor Blue print

A ship that can carry all this. The above is 1315 hull used. Any extra space, take more metals for the moment, and maybe 50 more workers to speed things up.

What to do

 * Important!: Bases have 50 space initially, remember this always!

Firstly, use the kit where you want your base to be. Quickly dock. Go to the items tab. Move 10 workers to the base, then 30 metals. Go to the construction tab, set a station expansion unit to build. Go to the items tab - equip it (right click, equip). You now have 150 space! Move enough metals to make two more, and the remaining workers and equip those. Move the extensor BP over, with 100 metals. Go to the control tab and add 50,000 credits to the base. Your new blue print costs money to build! In the items screen, use the blueprint, then set one to build. Once equipped, move over the ares shield & energy, equip them.

Then move any remaining materials across, and start stockpiling metals to make the adonis gear. If you want a slave to do this, make a trade bay, equip it, go to the control tab and select "add trade good..." Select metal, and set the base to buy for 1, and the amount to 4000. Then set a slave to help you! Once the adonis gear is made, equip it if you have the required skill - if you do not, get a team mate who is operator to do so. You'll have to make the base team in the control panel.

Once those are in, add whatever augs you think will help (space, range, firing, shields are good choices - bases tend not to need elec / energy augs), move in whatever you want to sell, and set your prices in the control tab!

Grats - your first base is done! Remember to keep the base fed!

How to make your life a whole lot easier:
Having space at first will help immensely - just go and buy three station extensors (smallest) and some larger ones from another player, to allow you to skip out the stage where you're in danger of having your base blown up. Complicated kits can help here as well.

Obviously, if you can ship in pre-made adonis gear and Extensor X's, this will also help.
 * Hint: Sporeside, in Nexus is a very good place to practice base laying in 'relative safety. Pro base layers can set up a full andman base in about 63 seconds - it'll take you a while to get that good 

Attached bases work in exactly the same way, but you'll want to understand extraction.. and perhaps even colonies first!

How do I do this commodity extraction thing?
Extracting commodities from planets and moons is the second most lucrative thing you can do with bases. So let's get digging!

Which skill will help me exploit commodities?
Extraction Expert (EE) will aid you greatly in harvesting resources. This skill increases the speed of acquiring resources from collectors by 3% per level compounded. Important: with EE, be sure to be doubly aware of your space constraints, it is very easy to over-fill bases.

EE costs 5 points / level, and is capped at double your Station Management skill, rounded up.

How do I find commodities?
You will require a planet scanner or surface scanner to detect resources. With one on your inventory, select a planet or moon and use the scanner. A read out will be produced in your events tab detailing the numbers of resources and so forth. If it is blank, there are no resources.

Each scanner has a power level: this determines which tier of commodities you can detect. At power 1 you will be able to see any of the common commodities, and the more most common ruin types. To see rarer types, you must get a better scanner.


 * Hint: EE types can find a good scanner in Serpica.

Important: Moons can only (usually) have 1-2 resources, planets can have many more. Planets are obviously generally better to set bases on.

Resources

Every planet or moon can have a potential set of resources. These are separated into tiers, of rarity and into divisions of amounts.

The commodities. Note that Each tier has a type that becomes rarer. E.g. Energies goes: Vis, Quantuum, Energon. Thanks to Calypso for correcting this list!


 * Tier 0 (Common): Space Oats, Boabobs, Metals, Silicon, Nuclear Waste
 * Tier 1 (Uncommon): Jelly beans, Copper, Tin, Petroleum, Silver, Vis, Titanium
 * Tier 2 (Rare): Alien Bacteria, Gold, Quantumum, Diamond, Ablution Crystals, Laconia, Enriched Nuclear Waste, Plasma Crystals, Psion Icicles
 * Tier 3 (Ultra-Rare): Bacta, Rubicite, Platinum, Energon, Adamantium, Fermium, Dark Matter, Frozen Blob

'''Important! Only planets can have organic resources such as space oats & Boabobs.'''

The size of a commodity determine the amount of extraction tools that can be set up:

Smidgen.........1 - 2 Little...............3 - 4 Bit..................5 - 8 Bunch.............9 - 16 A lot...............17 - 32 Plenty............33 - 64 Loads.............65 - 128

Note that the second tier commodities can come at most as a Bit, whilst tier three commodities will only come in smidgens.

Extractors

Common extractors can be found at any AI base. Advanced versions of certain of the common extractors (advanced harvesters, tree cutters) can only be gained through missions.

Rare commodity extractors can be found in the following locations:

Ring
 * Extractors- Tin, Copper, Silver, Titanium, Enriched Nuclear
 * Blue Prints - Gold, Platinum, Diamond

Absolution
 * Extractors: Ablution crystals, Vis, Psion Icicles
 * Blueprints: Quantuum, Energon

Bioloquique
 * Extractors: Petroluem, Jelly Bean
 * Blueprints: Alien Bactery, Bacta

Hyper
 * Extractors: Plasma Crystals

The remaining rarer extractors have to be built from BPs found in DGs, or through missions.

What do I do with things after extracting?
Well, you can either sell them (to colonies, AI stations or players) or process them further.

Many commodities can be changed into manufactured goods. You will find the items to do so in AI stations, or the BPs. There are numerous manufactured items to make, the simplest of which are Rations. Metals can be smelted into bars, space oats into whiskey and fine whiskey, and so forth.

Some examples:

Raw Materials -> Refiner = Manufactured good.

Peasant + silicon -> Crack Palace = Crack whore (yes, don't ask )

Space oats + boabobs -> still = Space whiskey

Peasant + Microchip -> Galactic Training Module = Worker

And so on. Its up to you to discover what can be made!


 * ''Hint: You'll find many of the rarer manufacturing process items in the special systems.

How can I get a Colony? How do they work?
Colonies are the linchpin to SS, and indeed are the only thing that allows you to be crowned emperor. They're also the source of great wealth, if run correctly.

Which skill will help me make good colonies?
Colonial Administrator (CA) gives +4% suitability per level. This affects the base suitability of a planet, turning the driest dustbowl into an Eden. Be aware that this figure is worked off the initial suitability, not a total figure. E.g. CA 10 on a planet with base suitability 37% will lead to a suitability of 52%, not 77%!

CA costs 10 points / level.

Planet suitability for Colonies
Each planet has three statistics that determine suitability for a colony. Temperature, climate and gravity. From worst to best:

Gravity - High -> Low -> Normal Temperature - Blistering -> Frozen -> Temperate Climate - Gaseous -> Noxious -> Terran

Whilst I could explain the mechanics of how this works (each is multiplied together to get a base suitability), the Pantalones have created a handy table & tool so you can quick check the suitability.

External link: Planet Suitability Table

Many thanks to the Pantalones for that!

Suitability determines the growth rate, size limit and commodity pricing of a Colony. Obviously, the higher the better - 125% is the capped limit though.

How to build them?
Firstly, you'll need an attached base on the planet. Then you'll have to get a colony blueprint from an AI base and build it in the construction tab, as you would any other. The type of colony print determines the size of the initial colony.
 * Hint: CA types can find specialist colony prints in Sol, that are a lot cheaper than usual ones.

Once you have built a colony, you will have a colony tab that you can check. The prices are what the colony will generally buy commods for. The larger the colony, the higher the prices they will pay, and the more of a commodity they will buy. Thus, population means credits!

Important!: these prices can fluctuate, and are a lot easier to "crash" than AI stations.

Colonies have a "tick over" rate of once / 2 hrs. Colonies will only buy / sell items on this tick.

Ok, how do I make them grow?
There are two main ways to do this, and one more sneaky, but apparently "ok" way.

Colonies will grow by themselves, dependent on suitability, if kept fed with rations. Growth is exponential, meaning the higher the size, the faster it will grow. Simply set the trade window to sell rations, the colony will buy what it needs - note that a colony will buy less of a commodity the higher the price, so with rations it's generally sensible to undercharge the colony massively.

The second way is to "peasant pump". Colonies will buy peasants, adding to their populations. Thus you can ship in a lot of peasants and then sell them to the colony, both getting cash and increasing the size of the colony.

The third way is to build multiple colonies at once - I'll leave you to figure out how to do it, if you don't get it correct, only the first built will count!

Are there any other tricks?
Lots. The main one is being able to sell vast amounts of peasants to a colony in its initial stages. Remember to sell your large colony an array of goods, to gain the most cash. E.g. Workers, Microchips, Crack whores.

Lastly, its a good idea to allow prices to rise again if they crash, in order to make credits.

Wait.. what are these strange Alien Ruins?!?
There are five types of alien ruins in the universe - four you can see, one you'll have to have a very powerful scanner to detect. These are: Mzungu, Faranjii, Bule, Vahaza and Ur'Qa.

When you build a colony on these planets, over time the inhabitants will un-earth strange technologies left behind by their past inhabitants. If you check the colony tab, you'll see them listed, usually at expensive prices. The older the colony, the more chance all will have been un-earthed.

To extract these items, set the base to buy them at slightly higher than the Colony cost, and wait. Different items take differing amounts of time to extract.

Important!: Ruin extracts are taken from a pool, weakest item first, so unless you want to waste cash extracting a weak item instead of a powerful one, its a very good idea to only set the base to extract one type at a time.


 * Hint: Ruin items come in abundances just like commodities, which determines the amount that can be extracted. Don't be surprised if you can't extract more than a few of the powerful items! Its also been rumored that you can sell extracts back to a colony... but never confirmed.

How do I protect my bases from other players?
Obviously, having better base gear will help, as will having more than one base protecting each other. Bases can build large healing weapons, that will heal each other, your slaves and you. You can further improve these odds by installing plating that gives resistances (or using kits that give it) and dampeners that reduce damage taken. Augmenters will also help.

However, there is a logical limitation to this, and Player vs Base combat is broken at best. Ideally, you want to aim for the lowest level possible with the highest technology. Be aware that Adonis and even Andaman non-mastery bases are rather easy to wipe out.

I'll leave you to work out how to do this - there's a very good reason most high level players build bases on their alternate characters, as loosing two weeks work and billions in credits is both possible, impossible to stop and extremely frustrating unless you can guarantee their safety. You can do this by building five Achilles uber-monster bases, but the more practical and cheaper solution is simply to make base almost impregnable to the level range attacking the base.

Until this changes, I would urge you to only build valuable bases on alternate characters. Also, be careful of trusting team-mates, the #1 cause of base loss is sabotage. Always have a black box on board in case.

Warning! A common error by low level builders is to forget about the nasty pest weapons, such as blow-worms that can kill bases with ease. Always installed Exterminator X or Ace pest controls on bases!

Is it worth protecting a system? What are the benefits? What are the dangers?
Protecting a system, in theory, makes it like an AI controlled system in that any hostile action will trigger all of the defences. Thus any attack will trigger massive firepower.

On the surface, this looks a great idea - in reality, it has a lot of dangers. Due to the way the PvP system works, if your base that could not be attacked by that Uber player armed to the teeth shoots at them through the protection system, they are then more than able to shoot back. This will lead to your base dying.

Likewise, its extremely easy to force bases to attack you in a protected system - and people can take damage, get healed and then have no level protection to worry about.

In practice, unless you're very certain of yourself, or are on one of the large teams, just don't do it.

Erm... yes, but how do I destroy bases?!?
Massive amounts of firepower and healers works, as does sabotage. Base vrs Base combat is also possible, given you can tractor them around.

Frankly killing bases is really easy if you know how the system works. I'll let you work that out for yourself.

Can you capture bases?
Yes. Capping works on bases just like on AI - the capping character must have enough skill for the tec level of the base, and enough free slots.

If you want to hand over bases, the best way is to clear AI, and unequip the shield. Remember to make the base team once more when you've capped it, if other's are equipping weapons. Important: also unequip the weapons, or the base will open fire on the person capping it.

'''Warning! Capping a base destroys any parked ships in it.'''

Can I upgrade the tec level of bases?
Yes, there are items that allow you to do this. AI stations carry some, ruins have others. You'll need station mastery to use these items.

Any other tricks / tips?
Bases can have chargers, solar collectors and so on, even without building the base versions, and ship dampeners work on them as well. You should aim to install dampeners, an overloader (bowstring etc), chargers, Apollo's collectors and so on.

The best aug combos for bases, I find, is usually 2 range, 1 firing and 1 God shield aug (dio / athena).

There's a few very nasty ways to wipe bases out, but I'm not telling you how.

Credits
This guide was written by Comet Chaser. It was originally copied from the Star Sonata forum from this thread.

The following notes were left in the guide regarding redistributing:

''Copyleft Comet Chaser - feel free to reproduce it, but at no cost & give a smidgen of credit! Thanks and credit also to: GrimSweeper, for writing a prior guide, that forms the core of most of this guide. Calypso for resource expertise. Pantalones genius who made the Base slot tool & suitability table.''