Guide:Mining out the Asteroids
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Mining out the Asteroids
A free players guide to using Asteroids.
To an upgraded player, Asteroids are an incredible asset. P-rings and P-shields cost 25%, You get 3 metal, and you have 2 crystal. This makes the Asteroid a great choice for an upgraded player, since you can build powerful defenses for cheap and make copious amounts of crystal mines to generate income for you. On first inspection - they do not appear to be a good choice for the free player - or are they? Here I will show how a free player can make the best use of an average Asteroid with a fertility of 4 and an Asteroid using just Fusion and Anti-matter plants with energy at 20 to power the base.
Pre-terraforming
You start with an area of 65. Not much to look at but what can we do with it? 65 slots are very hard to manage properly, but with some patience and sheer insanity on my part I built up one Asteroid using the resources that a free player has at their disposal into a very powerful base.
First we need production and construction:
16 Metal Refineries
12 Robotic Factories
12 Shipyards
All of these require 40 energy, which requires 5 Fusion plants, which require 17 Urban Structures in turn. This makes use of 57 of the slots available on the Asteroid and gives the base an economy of 40. Patience is required to further improve the base.
Now on to the defences:
2 Disruptor Turrets
1 Deflection Shield
These require 3 Fusion plants and one more Urban Structure to use and leaves us taking up 64 slots on the Asteroid with no excess energy. Next, build an extra Fusion plant (which will take up the remaining space and give us 8 energy to carry over to the terraforming phase of the Asteroid).
Terraforming
Upgrade all 5 levels of terraforming, providing an additional 25 slots and with 8 energy left over.
Then build:
5 Nanite Factories
5 Android Factories
This will require 3 more Fusion Plants and 4 Urban Structures, leaving us with 8 slots to build on, 2 Energy left over, and 3 Population left over. The Economy should now be at 60 and you should build one more Urban Structure and one more Fusion Plant, leaving 6 slots left over.
Build:
3 Metal Refineries
3 Robotic Factories
This brings the Metal Refinery count up to 19 and the Robotic Factory count up to 15; allowing you to build your P-rings and P-shields faster once Multi-level Platforms are used (bringing the total economy up to 66).
Multi-level Platforms and endgame
Multi-level Platforms and Orbital Bases add 50 to your Area and Population. Both should be maxed out, allowing you to have a good amount of area for you to build on.
Build:
5 Anti-matter Plants
3 Fusion Plants
3 P-rings
3 P-shields
Building these leave you with 36 slots left. What can be done with these? You can make an economic base out of them, or a maybe a pure production base for intensive ship building? Let’s look at both variations to see what they have to offer:
Economic bases will need 20 Spaceports, 5 Economic Centers and 7 Fusion Plants, leaving you with 4 open slots on the Asteroid and bringing the economy up too 121 (not counting the credits made on trade). Making just 20 credits on each trade route could earn an extra 100 cred/hr for you, giving a real economy of 221 for the Asteroid.
Production bases will need 12 Shipyards, 5 Orbital Shipyards (For Leviathans), 6 Metal Refineries, and 4 Robotic Factories. These will require an additional 10 Fusion Plants; leaving you around 10 open slots for whatever you want. They also add 22 to your economy, which now totals 88 for this version of the Asteroid base. Add 3 more Fusion Plants and you can also add 3 Jump gates to the base. Although weak in economic terms, this version can make up for that by allowing you to build large fleets of ships which can generate income by occupying other bases.
Closing notes
While it is possible to create a decent base out of an Asteroid for a free player as shown here, I do not suggest it. Even if you research energy up to 40 it is not advisable for a free player to make a base out of an Asteroid. The only benefit which a free player can get from the Asteroid is a massive reduction in price on P-rings and P-shields. To the free player I suggest 2 choices:
1) Search and pray that you can find a Crystalline planet that is empty - this way you can create a good economic base out of it. Alternatively, you could also just go for a Metal 3 planet and add 20 Spaceports to it.
2) If you truly have your heart set on using Asteroids, just bite the bullet and upgrade your account for a few months; save up the credits for 2 more bases and have the outpost ships ready to go. Upgrade your account for 3 months and spend those 3 months building up not just your new Asteroid bases; but all your bases.
