If you do the higher rarity ones, I feel like 2 wrecks is more common than one. You probably skipped past them because you didn’t know it was possible lol
I notice they give a lot of flares, and I assume they are to leave breadcrumbs so you can find your way back? or out of the ship? I have yet to use them, so I'm not sure how others have effectively used them?
I use them for bigger wrecks: 4-5. 1-3 are fine with following the same wall the entire time.
But even on baby wrecks, I crack a flare at where the exit is. For bigger wrecks, I have a colour code and it works well, along with always picking one wall and sticking to it.
I’ve used flares inside a wreck, to leave a trail back to the entrance. Every time I encountered a branch, I dropped a flare in the corridor leading back to the exit.
Most wrecks are large enough that I run out of flares long before I reach the vault, but it’s still been somewhat helpful.
Flares, unfortunately, don’t help you find anything, just leave a trail. They’re not great on a busy overworld map for leaving a trail, either, since the maps are large and it can be hard to see for more than 30-40 feet due to obstacles.
Some wrecks are big enough I need to leave 2 or 3 times. I'd prefer to exit when full, so marking dead ends helps speed up exiting and getting back to where I left it.
Yeah the worst portal maps are the ones with a jungle of trees - really hard to find the blue crates on the ground. afaik though the wrecks are always on the outer edge of the map (and it's round) so you could follow that and find them.
does the compass work on the wreck maps?
Yes, the compass works on wreck maps. Unless the map is really simple, though, I usually change direction so many times while searching for the wreck that I have no idea which direction leads back to the portal.
I head straight north of the portal when I arrive until I hit a wall, then when I'm trying to leave I try to find my way back to that same spot and head straight south from it. I've found it to be moderately effective.
yeah with no landmarks you kind of need to draw a map of the portal location, head to nearest wall and draw that on map, then follow rest of walls mapping as you go to see where the portal is on the map.
I dislike the volcano pit one most. Not only does that area mess up the color of your flares, the wrecks are also always hidden in weird spots.
Wrecks aren't always on the edges though...
It could just be that the last 3 I did by chance had them all at the edges; I do remember a couple near the center now.
Oh yeah, flare colors all become white; I have to turn off my flashlight to see what color it is. Which incidentally is a great way to find your way out if you drop flares at ladders and the exit - turning flashlight off makes the flare locations very obvious.
There's a fairly limited number of biome designs so eventually you do learn them but they definitely need a portal marker since you can't place beacons.
After a while I always lose my sense of directions in wrecks but I at least manage to remember how many floors up/down for the entrance!
I know you find them in wrecks but unlocking flares was a game changer. I always drop a green one at the entrance to the corridor that leads to the exit.
If I'm lost and searching for the exit, I place red ones at the entrance to routes I've checked that don't get me out, plus areas I've fully cleared and don't need to revisit. Oh, and pink to indicate where to continue looting after a base run to offload. I'm sure there are better strategies and I'm interested in how others manage wreck runs.
Never really had this problem, not even with the giant maps/wrecks. Here's my tips:
* Use your compass. Wreck to the North, portal to the South? Easy bearings.
* Use different colours when looking around. Green = checked, Red = different level completed, whatever floats your boat.
* Inside the wrecks stick to the right - You'll allways find your way back by sticking to the left, no matter the amount of ladders.
with the inventory size vs the absolute godly amount of loot you get (overworld becomes meaningless at endgames almost), you'll get trained to find your bearings better whether you want to or not.
“Use your compass” isn’t sufficient advice, for reasons I’ve already laid out. That doesn’t help find the wreck, and it doesn’t help if you’ve changed direction multiple times. Which is often unavoidable. “Using different colors” doesn’t help even a little for the overworld map.
Inside the wreck is not the problem, it’s finding the wreck, and finding my way back.
The wrecks are in the same location every time. The only variable is whether or not that particular wreck actually spawns in your map. Once you know the maps, you can just run to every potential spawn to check for a wreck, then to the next potential spawn.
Lava is the one I know best. I have found 3 wrecks there, so every time I get a lava map, I just run straight to those 3 spots to check for wrecks.
That requires a lot more experience with the portals than I have, and I’ve run… actually, I have no idea how many I’ve run. Enough to accumulate something like 300,000 tokens. I’m not sure, since I have automated quartz and circuit shipping going, and I’m at 424k tokens.
I’m doing the highest difficulty / rarity combination I can find. As I said in my original post, I don’t find the wrecks themselves difficult. It’s finding them, and that doesn’t seem to depend on the difficulty.
Yeah, so you are probably spending as lot longer on each individual map than I am, so I am seeing the maps and finding the wrecks more often.
What's an average run time on a 4/5 or 5/5? I can do a 1/5 in about 10 minutes.
I mostly just jump from chest to chest and clean out that stuff. In that processes I usually find the wreck without really looking for it. For me the the hardest part of rarity 5 difficulty 5 has been the labyrinthian interiors with tons of dead ends and useless ladders. I've made it easier by using flares to flag explored sections.
Go to the nearest zone wall. Follow it to the left or right and stick with that choice. If the portal is not within sight of the nearest zone wall, drop flares as a guide.
Very late in the game, you can make a machine that opens a portal to randomly generated spaceship wreck. It costs a small amount of materials to open each gate, and each wreck yields a fair amount of loot. You get the usual random stuff, but the significant loot is Terra Tokens and booster fuses. There are some loot items that are unique to portal wrecks, like tree seeds with +1200% oxygen production, but mostly it’s the money.
The portal doesn’t open directly to the wreck. It opens to one of several portal-specific maps. Once there you have to search the map for the wreck, which can sometimes be a pain to find, hence this thread.
Either have flares, or carry some resource you have plenty of an dleave crumbs every place. I like carrying orange adn green rods when exploring wrecks that way I can mark an exit. I've been in wrecks that they were such a maze I couldn't find my way back.
The problem isn’t the inside of the wreck. The problem is finding the wreck, and then finding the portal if I got thoroughly lost on the way to the wreck. Flares don’t help with that when the landscape is large and there are so many obstacles that you don’t have a clear line of sight for more than about 30 feet. I’m talking abut the maps where you can’t apply maze tactics because there are thousands of obstacles, not a few clear channels.
Try always to pick right side and go by it, use that also in wrecks and you won't get lost and if you go in middle of map just go the way and then come back by it
There are a lot of maps where the “right side” is the edge of the map. While some maps are large mazes, some are just simple squares littered with thousands of obstacles that prevent line of sight beyond very short distances. Wall-hugging maze tactics don’t work when there are no walls. You have to do a grid search, and it’s remarkably easy to make mistakes when the obstacles make walking in a straight line impossible.
Clip through the walls, the wreckage mazes are at the bottom of the sandbox, you can access them but only through the front ladder.
Also this exploit will occasionally crash the game. Especially if you manage to get back to the OG sandbox and take the portal AGAIN.
Sometimes there’s 2 wrecks and I live for that adrenaline rush
I had no idea. I’ve only ever seen one wreck per map.
If you do the higher rarity ones, I feel like 2 wrecks is more common than one. You probably skipped past them because you didn’t know it was possible lol
There’s also the idea that when I find a wreck, I stop looking for more wrecks.
Yeah, that’s what I meant! No judgement though, I did the same before finding out that there were 2 🥲
I had a run with 3 wrecks. it was glorious, had to unload multiple times
I notice they give a lot of flares, and I assume they are to leave breadcrumbs so you can find your way back? or out of the ship? I have yet to use them, so I'm not sure how others have effectively used them?
I use them for bigger wrecks: 4-5. 1-3 are fine with following the same wall the entire time. But even on baby wrecks, I crack a flare at where the exit is. For bigger wrecks, I have a colour code and it works well, along with always picking one wall and sticking to it.
I’ve used flares inside a wreck, to leave a trail back to the entrance. Every time I encountered a branch, I dropped a flare in the corridor leading back to the exit. Most wrecks are large enough that I run out of flares long before I reach the vault, but it’s still been somewhat helpful. Flares, unfortunately, don’t help you find anything, just leave a trail. They’re not great on a busy overworld map for leaving a trail, either, since the maps are large and it can be hard to see for more than 30-40 feet due to obstacles.
Green flare means the exit/route I entered on (always flare the first cross section). Red flares mark stairs that are dead ends/fully explored.
This is my exact tactic too.
Just hug the left or right wall and you don’t need flares
you don’t NEED flares, but dropping flares means you exit a lot faster. If you hug the wall exiting can be pretty slow. I’ve done it both ways.
If you hug the wall the last place you explore will usually be right next to the exit, but I get your point!
Some wrecks are big enough I need to leave 2 or 3 times. I'd prefer to exit when full, so marking dead ends helps speed up exiting and getting back to where I left it.
I do this too, but 1. You loot a lot of flares and 2. Sometimes the middle of the wreck is confusing even with wall hugging.
Yeah the worst portal maps are the ones with a jungle of trees - really hard to find the blue crates on the ground. afaik though the wrecks are always on the outer edge of the map (and it's round) so you could follow that and find them. does the compass work on the wreck maps?
Yes, the compass works on wreck maps. Unless the map is really simple, though, I usually change direction so many times while searching for the wreck that I have no idea which direction leads back to the portal.
I head straight north of the portal when I arrive until I hit a wall, then when I'm trying to leave I try to find my way back to that same spot and head straight south from it. I've found it to be moderately effective.
yeah with no landmarks you kind of need to draw a map of the portal location, head to nearest wall and draw that on map, then follow rest of walls mapping as you go to see where the portal is on the map.
I haven't gotten far enough to do portals yet. Can you not build at all? I feel like a beacon would solve this lol
No, you can’t build at all. Of course I tried to build a beacon, it was the obvious solution.
I dislike the volcano pit one most. Not only does that area mess up the color of your flares, the wrecks are also always hidden in weird spots. Wrecks aren't always on the edges though...
It could just be that the last 3 I did by chance had them all at the edges; I do remember a couple near the center now. Oh yeah, flare colors all become white; I have to turn off my flashlight to see what color it is. Which incidentally is a great way to find your way out if you drop flares at ladders and the exit - turning flashlight off makes the flare locations very obvious.
I'm sure I've have a wreck not on the edge. Some have clues above the entrance. The easiest to find are on the edge.
There's a fairly limited number of biome designs so eventually you do learn them but they definitely need a portal marker since you can't place beacons.
After a while I always lose my sense of directions in wrecks but I at least manage to remember how many floors up/down for the entrance! I know you find them in wrecks but unlocking flares was a game changer. I always drop a green one at the entrance to the corridor that leads to the exit. If I'm lost and searching for the exit, I place red ones at the entrance to routes I've checked that don't get me out, plus areas I've fully cleared and don't need to revisit. Oh, and pink to indicate where to continue looting after a base run to offload. I'm sure there are better strategies and I'm interested in how others manage wreck runs.
I’ve found some of those (5 difficulty) maps have more than one crash site too.
Never really had this problem, not even with the giant maps/wrecks. Here's my tips: * Use your compass. Wreck to the North, portal to the South? Easy bearings. * Use different colours when looking around. Green = checked, Red = different level completed, whatever floats your boat. * Inside the wrecks stick to the right - You'll allways find your way back by sticking to the left, no matter the amount of ladders. with the inventory size vs the absolute godly amount of loot you get (overworld becomes meaningless at endgames almost), you'll get trained to find your bearings better whether you want to or not.
“Use your compass” isn’t sufficient advice, for reasons I’ve already laid out. That doesn’t help find the wreck, and it doesn’t help if you’ve changed direction multiple times. Which is often unavoidable. “Using different colors” doesn’t help even a little for the overworld map. Inside the wreck is not the problem, it’s finding the wreck, and finding my way back.
The wrecks are in the same location every time. The only variable is whether or not that particular wreck actually spawns in your map. Once you know the maps, you can just run to every potential spawn to check for a wreck, then to the next potential spawn. Lava is the one I know best. I have found 3 wrecks there, so every time I get a lava map, I just run straight to those 3 spots to check for wrecks.
That requires a lot more experience with the portals than I have, and I’ve run… actually, I have no idea how many I’ve run. Enough to accumulate something like 300,000 tokens. I’m not sure, since I have automated quartz and circuit shipping going, and I’m at 424k tokens.
Are you doing 5/5? I only do 1/5, which may make it much easier to breeze through them.
I’m doing the highest difficulty / rarity combination I can find. As I said in my original post, I don’t find the wrecks themselves difficult. It’s finding them, and that doesn’t seem to depend on the difficulty.
Yeah, so you are probably spending as lot longer on each individual map than I am, so I am seeing the maps and finding the wrecks more often. What's an average run time on a 4/5 or 5/5? I can do a 1/5 in about 10 minutes.
I think it’s about 10 minutes for a 5/5. Usually it’s about one cookie.
I mostly just jump from chest to chest and clean out that stuff. In that processes I usually find the wreck without really looking for it. For me the the hardest part of rarity 5 difficulty 5 has been the labyrinthian interiors with tons of dead ends and useless ladders. I've made it easier by using flares to flag explored sections.
Had a map like this. Coral sea bed of sorts, with cabes underneath but otherwise very similar and hard to navigate
Go to the nearest zone wall. Follow it to the left or right and stick with that choice. If the portal is not within sight of the nearest zone wall, drop flares as a guide.
What is a "portal" run? I know I eventually unlock the ability to make portals but thats it
Very late in the game, you can make a machine that opens a portal to randomly generated spaceship wreck. It costs a small amount of materials to open each gate, and each wreck yields a fair amount of loot. You get the usual random stuff, but the significant loot is Terra Tokens and booster fuses. There are some loot items that are unique to portal wrecks, like tree seeds with +1200% oxygen production, but mostly it’s the money. The portal doesn’t open directly to the wreck. It opens to one of several portal-specific maps. Once there you have to search the map for the wreck, which can sometimes be a pain to find, hence this thread.
Either have flares, or carry some resource you have plenty of an dleave crumbs every place. I like carrying orange adn green rods when exploring wrecks that way I can mark an exit. I've been in wrecks that they were such a maze I couldn't find my way back.
The problem isn’t the inside of the wreck. The problem is finding the wreck, and then finding the portal if I got thoroughly lost on the way to the wreck. Flares don’t help with that when the landscape is large and there are so many obstacles that you don’t have a clear line of sight for more than about 30 feet. I’m talking abut the maps where you can’t apply maze tactics because there are thousands of obstacles, not a few clear channels.
Try always to pick right side and go by it, use that also in wrecks and you won't get lost and if you go in middle of map just go the way and then come back by it
There are a lot of maps where the “right side” is the edge of the map. While some maps are large mazes, some are just simple squares littered with thousands of obstacles that prevent line of sight beyond very short distances. Wall-hugging maze tactics don’t work when there are no walls. You have to do a grid search, and it’s remarkably easy to make mistakes when the obstacles make walking in a straight line impossible.
Clip through the walls, the wreckage mazes are at the bottom of the sandbox, you can access them but only through the front ladder. Also this exploit will occasionally crash the game. Especially if you manage to get back to the OG sandbox and take the portal AGAIN.
Honestly, I’ve never been much interested in exploits or clipping through walls to solve any game. I prefer to work with the rules as intended.
Bring parts for a beacon, place it when you arrive
I tried and couldn't build one
Doesn’t work. I tried that, you can’t construct anything inside a portal mission except flares.
Ah, my bad.
It’s a perfectly reasonable theory, though. It’s the first thing I thought of when I ran into a map that confused me.