Difference between revisions of "Exploration"

Revision as of 12:52, 5 January 2014

The crew of the Daedalus can embark on Expeditions to foreign planets, restocking the ship's resources and discovering various adventurous zones and artifacts. Some precautions need to be taken before an Expedition can be started, and a larger number of characters will need to work together to load fuel, send the Daedalus on its course and embark on the journey.

Launching an Expedition

Steps for an expedition launch:

• You have to find a planet with the Astro Terminal.
• Someone has to put right amount of Fuel needed, if the Fuel isn't correct and the Daedalus moves, the planet will be lost forever.
• Your Captain has to turn the Daedalus in the right direction and then engage the trip (Each takes 1 ).
• Optional: Finish the scan if you didn't already, in order to make sure you won't encounter things you don't want to see (generally this means Volcanoes, Mankarog and Seismic zones).
• Assemble your expedition crew in Icarus Bay and take off.
• The Expedition will happen automatically.
• When you're on an Expedition, all discovered items, fruit and food appear automatically in the Icarus Bay. When on a patrol ship they appear when the patrol ship gets back.
• Once the Expedition is done, someone will have to put 1 Fuel in the Combustion Chamber, and the Captain has to move out of orbit.

You can't launch an expedition under these circumstances:

• The planet is fully explored
• An expedition is currently happening
• If the Crew Lock is on [Pilot], the one who launches the expedition has to be a pilot.

Miscellaneous notes:

• If someone dies during the expedition, everything they were carrying is permanently lost.
• If the Daedalus is moved during an Expedition, the exploring craft and all characters on the expedition will be lost forever (unless the Magnetic Net project is unlocked).

Useful Skills

Certain characters' skills lend themselves to Expeditions especially well, granting the exploring crew various bonuses.

Botanist: +1 to fruit gained from Harvests.

Diplomat: Disables Combat outcomes from alien meetings. It won't protect you from accidents or from getting smashed by a Mankarog.

Sprinter: +1 area visited per Sprinter.

Shooter: +1 to strength of your team during Combat. Does not stack. TODO: Needs to be confirmed...

Survivalist:

• Personal damage to the survivalist is reduced by 1 point.
• The event Provision gives 1 more Alien Steak.
• Last to die in case of fatal events. It means that if you had to die (in case of some fatal event) someone else will.

Useful Equipment

Quadrimetric Compass:

• Protects the group from the Wandering event.
• Protects the wielder from the Lost event.

Spacesuit: Allows explorers to go on a planet without oxygen.

Rope: Cancels personal damage that can happen to you in the areas Seismic, Cave and Mountain. Does not prevent sudden death.

White Flag: Cancels the chance of Combat in the Intelligent Life event.

Echo-Locator: Chance to explore a Hydrocarbon zone is multiplied by 5.

Drill: Double any Resources#Fuel gains during the expedition.

Babel Module: The chance to gain an artfact in the Intelligent Life event is doubled.

ThermoSensor: Chance to explore Ruminant, Predator, Intelligent Life, Mankarog, Insects and Lost zones is multiplied by 5.

Post-Its: Can be used to fill empty inventory slots to reduce the chance of losing an important object during exploration.

Weapons

Blaster: +1 added to the strength of your team during Combat.

Knife: +1 added to the strength of your team during Combat.

Natamy: +1 added to the strength of your team during Combat.

Lizaro Jungle: +1 added to the strength of your team during Combat.

Old Faithful (Machine Gun): +2 added to the strength of your team during Combat.

Rocket-Launcher: +3 added to the strength of your team during Combat.

Grenade: +3 added to the strength of your team during Combat. (one time use and consumed at the 1st Combat). If a crew member carries more than one, one will be used per fight.

Gameplay Mechanics

The exploration occurs automatically, one zone every 10 minutes.

9 of the planet's zones explored in the Icarus, 3 with a patrol ship, and 1 more for each Sprinter in the group.

Each zone can be explored once, but a visit may fail to explore.

Each zone has 4 possible outcomes. (for details see Zones)

Item gains (Steaks, O2, Fuel, Fruits) reported by the game already include the bonuses from any Skills and inventory items mentioned above.

Non-sudden death Combat takes place as follows:

• The creature's strength is determined by the zone, the Shipwreck encounter being the exception.
• The strength of the crew is 1 per member plus any bonuses from skills and equipment.
• If the group's strength is inferior to the creature's strength, the difference in strength is spread across the group as damage. (not necessarily in an equal way)
• If the crew wins, they simply don't take any damage, there are no other effects.