any starting tips?
lunatictrenton
Join Date: 2016-01-22 Member: 211825Members
Join Date: 2016-01-22 Member: 211825Members
Comments
You probably want to think about alternate ways to charge up your Seamoth because by itself, the Power cells can get pretty costly to keep made and they run down quick IMO. Lots of people love building a Cyclops but I personally did not care for the big clunky sausage so I skipped it in my new game and aimed straight for getting a moonpool first to charge my Seamoth. Pro Tip: Geo-Thermal Power Generators placed over a natural thermal vent (get the thermometer plugin on your HUD!) is by far the most efficient way to keep your base and Seamoth charged non-stop and never run out of delicious power! Solar Panels are for rookies.
TBH, that part, getting the parts for the moonpool was up until now the best part of the game imho (partly)
Take the risk! Explore that creepy area! I'm scared a lot when I play this game, I'm afraid of the ocean, but I love the ocean as well. Even so, I'm learning to conquer my fears with Subnautica.
So in conclusion, my tip is to just go out there, no matter how scary and creepy it can be.
yeah, I dislike those little pods, makes me think of the alien movies. XD
Put storage modules on your seamoth when you go collecting resources. (Note: You need the Moonpool)
Repulsion Cannon is a ton of fun and might save your life once you can build it.
70+ (I think that is the cutoff) on Food and Water will regen your HP, can be more beneficial that health packs.
Mistakes I made at my first playthrough
You can carry more than one fish at once
Just because there is an animation that shows you holding the fish in one hand does not mean you cannot carry 2 or 3 in your inventory. Saves trip time when fishing! I was like 20h in the game when I realized that was just graphics and I could hold more fish in my inventory. Imagine me going fishing in an ever more emptying ocean and dragging one fish at the time back to the fabricator. Imagine the relief I felt when I got the Thermoblade.
Needed Equipment at the very start (from my experience, you mileage may vary)
Equipment not needed at the very start
Stay in Safe Shallows!
I had some bad luck when my first game started and I spawned at a corner of the Safe Shallows Zone. I had 3 quarters of my horizon filled with Kelp Zone and only one quarter with Safe Shallows. I went down far too early when I did not have enough diving time because of missing tanks. I was so short on quartz it wasn't funny. Quartz is mainly found in Safe Shallows and only rarely in Kelp zone. This lead to a frustrating cycle of diving down to Kelp ground looking around a few seconds anf going back up for air. So save yourself the frustration and stay in Safe Shallows until you have all the equipment mentionend earlier. (Except for the Still Suit, of course...)
Learn how to use air pipes
This saves valuable diving time. Construct an air pipe (10 pipes cost 6 titanium and can get you through the Kelp Forest down to the border of the Grassy Plains Zone. Mark the end with a beacon so you can find it faster. If you are out of oxygen you need to find it FAST! Not only the end provides oxygen, you can get oxygen even from the blue tubes by swimming into them. If you are done in the area, harvest everything and then pick the pipe back up to build a new pipe somewhere else.
Silver
Silver ore can be found in the Kelp and Grassy Plains Zone. In the Kelp Zone it is on the ground (not on the walls) There is actually a lot of silver and you eventually only need a certain finite amount as it builds equiment that does not deterioriate. However it felt as there was literally NO silver and I needed it for everything.
Your health regenerates
Yes, your body heals, but only if the nutrient bar is over 80% (I think, at least it seems so) I do not know if the hydration bar has a similar threshold. Healing isn't exactly fast, but in time injuries disappear. So instead of buring through medipacks, have a feast and tread lightly a little.
Your escape capsule can move
Sometimes, it even moves on its own. If you want to relocate the thing, push it while swimming and it will move. So if the resources are used up in the area, move on to another region. Or if you do not like the sights. Or the smell. Or the neighbours.
The first base
You need a base to put your fragment analyzer [edit: there is no fragment analyzer anymore] and the workbench in it. My first base ever was in safe shallows, which seemed like a good idea. But it wasn't for several reasons:
- A base literally 10m under the sea level will grant you nothing except storage space. It doesn't let you access areas where you could not go before since you could just go to the surface instead.
- After I got the Cyclops I couldn't navigate there anymore (it is way too large and the water is too shallow)
In a recent playthrough I put it at the border of Kelp to the western Grassy Plains Zone near the entrance to the Jelly Mushroom Caves. I had a bad experience with the northern Grassy Plains field, which is full of shooting Spike Plants of doom, and the eastern field, which for the most part lies in the radiation zone, the western field is much better. It has more and better accessible resources and no Spike Plants. This is roughly west of the starting position. Swim into the direction of the Floating Island (the larger of the two visible island) and you will hit it eventually. If not, explore, that's what the game is all about.The Seamoth
After the first base you will feel the urge to build a Seamoth. In its unupgraded form it has a measly safe depth of 125m and will eventually use up power cells if you drive around too much. That is ok, in the beginning we can live with that. You can go around quite a bit before the power cell expires and there are enough resources availlable to build a lot more. If you know what you are doing, you can get the Moonpool (and with it the ability to recharge the Seamoth!) before the first power cell hits 50%. [edit: that is not possible anymore since you need 5 fragments but you can get those 5 Moonpool fragments with an unupgraded Seamoth. I do it regularily, there definitly are 5 at depths of up to 250m, you need to look for them. Keep your Seamoth at 200m and exit for a quick surgical dive.]
Edit: Formatting
Better to slow down the pace of your first game so you can really enjoy it.
I suspect that building insanely large bases might have an adverse impact on the display frame-rate.
I will keep that in mind, I have been recording subnautica for my channel and figured things like the seamoth would be good things to work towards, so that the episodes have a bit of direction
Getting the materials to make a base for one is going to require a lot of materials, especially a lot of quartz for windows and aquariums, titanium and for reinforcement lithium. I spend a good deal of time collecting materials in my game to make a decent base even while I'm exploring. As for framerates I've never encountered an issue but I've never built anything to near 20-30 or higher hab modules.
And if you're really going to mine resources, the Clops can be a cargo ship if you add loads of cabinets
I would never discourage exploration by swimming however - so I want to make sure anyone learning the game does a fair amount of both. I used the upgraded flippers, 2 upgraded tanks and the seaglide a lot more than I did the Seamoth at first. Eventually the Seamoth became my favorite for deep exploration and anywhere I might encounter a Reaper (the defensive zapper is such a nice thing to have!) - I like having options and they were all fun to build. For me, it was only the cyclops that seemed a waste of materials after I already had a well established base, I really didn't feel like I needed a mobile home too haha.
yeah I don't really use the cyclops as a mobile base, I use it mostly as a mobile storage container for when I go out resource collecting for building a base or adding to my base. And also of course finding a location for a base.
Gather resources and then use the clops to scout out a location for a base and then proceed to construct said base with the clops close by so I can get the materials for it from it.
Are we talking the Charging Flippers? Since those things are a godsend and once I made them I never took them off. Charge my stasis rifle, welder, and flashlight JUST by swimming around? The only thing that I'll need to make batteries for are to power my Seaglide (and maybe make power cells for my Cyclops, since my Seamoth just gets charged by my moonpool and base's eight solar panels)? YES PLEASE!
It's time to choose Mr. @lunatictrenton