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FAQ

Types of Harvesters

1. Mineral

Mineral harvesters are used to harvest all metals, ores, solid petrochemicals, and radioactives (see also fusion generators). A mineral harvester can be used to extract any resource found using a mineral survey tool.

2. Chemical

Chemical harvesters are used to harvest anything you can find using a chemical surveying tool, such as inert petrochemicals, liquid petrochem fuel, fiberplast, and lubricating oil.

3. Wind Generators

Wind Generators are used to harvest wind energy for use in other installations. The energy harvested by a wind generator is produced in a liquid form and stored in a canister-like object that you can carry in your inventory. This power can *only* be used in other harvesters, factories and so on as a power source.

There is only one type of wind generator. It has no power requirements, as it produces, not conusmes power. It does have a maintenance requirement, however.

In general, wind generators are considered to be the low end of power generation. They do not produce large amounts of energy, but they are suitable for running a few small to medium harvesters, or for low-volume operations. Their main advantage is that they are cheap, as they can be produced by Artisans and do not require an Architect to make. An Artisan with Engineering II can make a Wind power generator, although it will not be a very good one.

3. Solar

Solar Harvesters, or Solar Power Generators, are used to harvest solar energy for use in other installations. The energy harvested by a solar generator is produced in a liquid form and stored in a canister-like object that you can carry in your inventory. This power can *only* be used in other harvesters, factories and so on as a power source.

There is only one type of solar generator. It has no power requirements, as it produces, not conusmes power. It does have a maintenance requirement, however.

Solar generators are a good middle of the road power generation solution. They are not too expensive to maintain, yet produce a decent amount of energy. You won't run a huge fleet of industrial harvesters with them, but you can get some pretty decent amounts of power, if you get some with a good Base Extraction Rate.

4. Fusion

Fusion Generators are the high end of power generation. Fusion generators are placed on veins of radioactives, preferably with the highest PE possible, and produce this resource by the ton. If properly used, they are the best bang for the buck in terms of power generation. You can get a lot of power very quickly with a good fusion generator.

5. Water

Moisture vaporators are used to get water from the environment. Although no one is required to drink water, many medical components and craftable items require water of one type or another- the most popular being Talusian water, from the moon Talus.

6. Flora

Flora refers to anything organic that isn't an animal. This includes stuff like berries, wheat, wood, and other organics that you would normally farm and/or harvest from trees or plants. Many medical components and spices require flora of one type or another, and chefs need a lot of flora items.

Harvester Basics

Harvesters are structures that you can place in a resource rich spot of that will automatically sample resources for you while you're off doing something else. Basically, you craft or buy a harvester, find a spot of land that contains a good concentration of the resource you are looking for and place it. You must then feed it power and pay maintenance to get it up and going. Other people can use your harvesters, add them to the admin list for full control, or the hopper list for only hopper control.

Who can use harvesters?

Anyone can use any type of harvester. If you have the deed for one, you can place it, assuming you have the lots available. Although any player can place a harvester, the Surveying tree in the Artisan class is required to locate particular resources, so the harvester can operate most efficiently.

How are harvesters placed?

Harvesters are placed like any other structure. Once you locate a suitable spot for your harvester, open your inventory and double-click the deed you wish to place, or select "Place Structure" from the radial menu. You will be shown an overhead view of your current area, with a "wireframe" outline of the harvester to be placed that you can move around to different locations by moving the mouse. The "footprint" of the harvester will be a square or rectangular block that moves around with the wireframe diagram.

Move the wireframe around to find a suitable location. If you can place a harvester, the footprint will become green as you move it over the spot. If you cannot place a harvester in a particular location, the footprint is red. You can click the right mouse button to rotate the footprint and try different orientations for your harvester.

Once you are satisfied with the location of your harvester, click the left mouse button to place the structure. If all the requirements are met, the deed will disappear from your inventory and you'll see a structure marker appear where you placed the harvester. After a few moments, the harvester itself will appear, ready for you to use.

If you can't find a suitable location, press ESC on your keyboard to return to the normal view, move to a different location, and try again.

Common Placement Problems

Harvesters cannot be placed near;

• Points of interest (POIs)
• Municipal zones (static cities),
• Near lairs.

Notes

Each harvester (regardless of size or type) requires excactly ONE lot. Players have 10 lots available to them, so there is a max on the number of harvesters you can place. If you have no more lots, you cannot put down an additional harvester.

Harvesters require a flat space to be placed. The larger the harvester, the larger the area required (usually) for the harvester. You'll have a very difficult time placing a large harvester in the mountains or on hills, because there needs to be enough flat space for the harvester's footprint.

Some harvesters have irregular or rectangular footprints. You can rotate the footprint during the placement process by using the right mouse button, allowing you to try different orientations.

You can move the footprint around quite a bit while searching for a suitable placement spot- dragging the footprint to the edge of the screen will cause it to scroll automatically, up to a certain distance. However, if you can't find a suitable location, you'll have to try elsewhere.

What Stops a Harvester Running

• You or someone authorized to do so shuts it down
• It runs out of power
• Its output hopper fills up
• It runs out of maintenance (and is destroyed, along with its resources)
• The resource being harvested shifts out.

Extraction Rates

Harvester Extraction rates are the amount of resource that is gained per each minute of operation on the machine. The extraction rating is

Output per minute = Extraction rate in kg/h * density %

Example: A medium mineral harvester with an extraction rate of 6 kg on a 75% aluminum density will give you

(6 * 0.75) = 270 units per hour production or 6480 per day

Harvester Operations

Naming

Harvesters can have be renamed once they are placed into the world. To Set the Name of a particular harvester use the "Set Name" command in the radial menu.

Harvester Status

The harvester status window displays number of information about the structure such as:

1. The structure owner's name
2. Privacy Status
3. Condition
4. Maintenance Pool
5. Maintenance Rate
6. Power Reserves
7. Power Consumption

One can Check the Status of a Harvester by;

• Select "Status" from the Radial Menu
• Select "Manage"
• Select "Status" (from within Manage)

How to Operate

Once a harvester has been placed, select "Operate Machinery" from the radial menu. From the resulting window, you can click the "Select Resource" button to select a resource to harvest. The available list will be dependent on the location and planet you've placed your harvester. After selecting a resource to harvest, you can click "Turn Harvester On" to start the harvester, or "Turn Harvester Off" to shut it down.

The Operate Screen

Shows;

• Base Extraction Rate (BER) of the harvester, referred to as "Spec Rate." This is the rated value on the deed.
• Actual extraction rate (AER) which is based on the density of the resource at a given location. This is the rate at which the harvester will use to calculate the per minute unit count of resource collection.

Retrieving Resources

• Open the "Operate" screen.
• Locate the button marked "Open Output Hopper".
• Select which resources you wish to retrieve.

Notes

• Choose "Dump Hooper" to remove and delete all resources in the Hooper.

How To Power A Harvester

To add power;

• Select "Deposit Power" from the radial menu.
• A screen will appear showing the amount of power you have in your inventory, enter an amount or drag a slider to select the amount to deposit.

How to Re-Deed a Harvester

To Re-Deed a Harvester, select "Destroy Structure", and if all parameters are met (Green) it will be "re-deeded"

Once all conditions have been satisfied the player may proceed to continue on with the next step which is to input a generated serial number for the particular re-deed event. The player must input the exact number into the field as given. If the number is input incorrectly or not at all then the re-deed attempt will fail and the player will have to start the process over again.

Notes

You cannot mix power types.
You cannot remove money/power from harvesters.

Power and maintenance remains during a re-deed; if you examine the deed in your inventory, it will show the amount of maintenance and power in the harvester.