Ships 101

Hello, and welcome to Ships 101!

This article will walk you through making a few simple ships that can help you get around and gather resources.

For the purposes of this instructive article, it will be assumed that you have installed the game and begun playing either in Single Player / Creative mode, or on one of the many multiplayer servers available. It will be assumed that you know little to nothing about building a ship in Starmade (for instructions on piloting ships, please see Controls).

Core Shuttle

Core Shuttles or Pods or Space Bikes are fundamental tools. Every player should know how to make one quickly for getting from place to place over short ranges, and you should always - at all times - carry enough extra materials to make several of these micro shuttles. They prevent you getting stranded in deep space if you lose your ship, or simply spending several minutes moving to another entity when there is no teleporter available. They also make excellent quick landers for getting onto and off of planets, since landing larger ships on planets is liable to crash your client.

To build a Core Shuttle:

• Press 'X' to spawn a new Ship Core, and press 'ENTER' at the popup to accept the default name.
• Face your new core and press 'R' to board it.
• Press 'SPACE BAR' to enter Build Mode.
• Select a Reactor Module in your toolbar and 'LEFT-CLICK' once to place a reactor anywhere on your core.
• Select a Thruster Module in your toolbar and 'LEFT-CLICK' once to place a thruster anywhere on your core (place up to 4 of these for additional acceleration, if you wish, but no more or you may exceed your reactor's power output).

You are now on board a small, fast core shuttle. Press 'SPACE BAR' again to return to Flight Mode and get a feel for the handling in this functional pseudo-ship. It moves much faster than a core alone, and is powerful enough to break free of planetary gravity. When you finish using it, simply return to build mode and delete all modules to return them to your inventory.

Jury Miner

The Jury Miner is another common, ad hoc tool. If you are just starting out (or re-starting after death) and don't have a faction to turn to, or ally who can help you out with a small ship, this will be your essential way to get back on your feet by gathering some resources to sell for credits in order to buy components to build a better ship.

It is only slightly more complex than a simple Core Shuttle, particularly if you aren't terribly picky about aesthetics at this point since this ship will also probably be deleted after a short period of use.

To build a Jury Miner:

• Press 'X' to spawn a new Ship Core, and press 'ENTER' at the popup to accept the default name.
• Face your new core and press 'R' to board it.
• Press 'SPACE BAR' to enter Build Mode.
• Select a Reactor Module in your toolbar and 'LEFT-CLICK' to place a cube of 8, adjacent reactors at the back of your core (don't surround the core - you need free access to it).
• Select a Thruster Module in your toolbar and 'LEFT-CLICK' once to place a brick of 20-30 thrusters at the back of your reactor.
• Select a Storage Module in your toolbar and place one somewhere near your core (for ease of access).
• Looking at your storage module, make sure it is highlighted in yellow. If not, press 'C' while selecting it to highlight it.
• Select a Cargo Space Module in your toolbar and place a few anywhere on your ship. They should be highlighted purple. If not, remove them and ensure that your storage module is highlighted before attempting to place them again.
• Select a Salvage Computer and place it near your storage module. Use 'C' while looking at the salvage module to ensure it is highlighted yellow, then look at your storage module and press 'V' to link the two.
• Select a Salvage Module and place a brick of 20 of them somewhere on your ship that will not block your view in flight mode. These should appear highlighted purple if you had your salvage computer selected (yellow highlight) when you placed them.

You are now on board a (hideously ugly, but useful) small mining ship. All the resources you mine will automatically be stored in the ship's storage module, which you can access by looking at it and pressing 'R'.

Jump Shuttle

A basic jump shuttle will get you where you're going in decent time - even if it's on the other side of the galaxy. They also make fair ships for shopping around at various trade stations if you haven't yet built a facility with a shop tied to the trade network for ordering deliveries of resources and components. A basic jump shuttle can make a fair scouting vessel if you add a Reactor Stealth Chamber or two to reduce chances of detection.

//add chambers

Escort Fighter

A simple drone craft designed to follow you around and protect you from hostiles. It can't take on a cruiser, it probably can't take on a standard fighter, but it can discourage casual predators and may distract an attacking player long enough for you to escape. Mainly it's a good foundation for building stronger escort vessels to better protect you while you mine and travel.

//add weapons