Star Atlas 101 — A Preview Guide of Manufacturing Strategies in Starbased v1
“Starbased” is the next major iteration of the Star Atlas browser-based game experience, anticipated to come out in the next few weeks. Starbased will replace the current SAGE Labs experience, and bring entirely new gameplay loops.
Manufacturing will play a prominent role in Starbased, and so we at Galia Crafters wanted to summarize the major changes here, drawing from publicly available information and announced updates.
Please keep in mind that Starbased is still in active development, including the initial closed playtest in the very near term, so things may change. Check back here and on the Star Atlas Discord for the latest!
This guide is for informational purposes only, and is not financial advice. Please do your own research before making any financial decisions.
If you are new to Star Atlas, we recommend you familiarize yourself with some of the overall mechanics by reading our previous guide.
For a general overview of the Star Atlas Town Hall where much of the latest Starbased information was shared, we suggest you look at various community content, including this article from RahMega in ROME.
In this preview guide, we’ll cover off some of the biggest changes relevant to manufacturers, including:
Changes in ATLAS Distribution
The Loyalty Points System
Starbase Upgrading and Maintenance
New Resources and Recipes
Key Anticipated Manufacturing Strategies
Changes in ATLAS Distribution
Currently, ATLAS is distributed (emitted) to the player base primarily through Faction Fleet and Council RFR redemptions.
Faction Fleet is a passive staking mechanic where ships are staked, consume R4, and produce ATLAS.
Council RFRs are items that are crafted in SAGE Labs from various resources, and ‘turned in’ through the Star Atlas Marketplace in return for ATLAS.
With Starbased, both of these mechanisms will be deactivated.
In Starbased, ATLAS emissions will come from a completely different system, based on Loyalty Points (LP), detailed below.
When Starbased launches, 4.5 million ATLAS will be divided up equally amongst the three factions as emissions each epoch, so 1.5 million ATLAS per faction. One epoch is equivalent to one real-world day. The ATLAS will be distributed to players in each faction based on the LP they decide to spend for that epoch.
This is a fundamental change in the ‘reward system’ of Star Atlas, and shifts focus from passive staking to rewarding engaged gameplay, as well as introduces an element of competition.
The Loyalty Points System
Loyalty Points (referred to as LP) will be the primary mechanism for ATLAS emissions, as mentioned above. In the first iteration of Starbased, LP will be earned in two ways: upgrading Starbases and maintaining Starbases.
Let’s break down each of these options and what it means.
Upgrading Starbases
When Starbased launches, the Galia game map will contain one CSS for each faction, as well as a number of Starbases; this is similar to today. However, only the CSS’ will be fully upgraded, at Tier 6. Every other Starbase will start at Tier 1.
The biggest differences upon launch in the tiers is the ability to craft more complex components and items as the Starbases are upgraded. While specific recipe availability hasn’t been shared yet, we can likely anticipate that lower tier Starbases would allow crafting of ‘simpler’ recipes such as Hydrogen to Fuel, while higher tier Starbases would allow the crafting of the downstream recipes, such as Particle Accelerators.
From a manufacturer’s standpoint, upgrading specific Starbases in each region will be key, as it will optimize supply chains. For example, in the ONI region, MRZ-24 contains both Iron Ore and Copper Ore. If that Starbase is not upgraded and remains at Tier 1, we can surmise that mining Iron Ore and Copper Ore will be possible, and perhaps even turning that into Iron and Copper might also be possible.
But, trying to build Magnets and Copper Wire, and then turning that into Electromagnets, will undoubtably require the Starbase to be upgraded. Thus, if the Starbase remains un-upgraded, then all of the lower level materials would need to be shipped out to either the CSS or an upgraded Starbase, which adds considerable time and expense, which in turn means lower efficiency and profits.
Note that the SA team has mentioned the resources currently present in SAGE Labs may shift to different locations in Starbased, especially with new resources also being added (more details on this later). It is advisable to not go into Starbased expecting mining and production routes to stay the same.
Collectively then as a manufacturing profession, it may be advantageous to focus on certain priority Starbases so that efficient supply chains can be setup. However, others who do not focus on manufacturing may not care about this, so Starbased will be sure to bring collaboration as well as potentially inter-faction arguments!
Specifically around earning LP in the context of upgrading Starbases, LP will be earned in contributing materials towards the upgrade, as well as assigning crew to help with the upgrade. This means that both materials and crew must be brought to each Starbase being upgraded.
There are some additional nuances still be discussed by the team around edge cases in earning LP during upgrades, but we’ll leave this here for now and provide updates as more details are confirmed.
Maintaining Starbases
LP can also be earned through contributing to the maintenance of Starbases. Starbases require R4 to function. If food runs out, all crafting will stop. If toolkits run out, all upgrading will stop.
Note that the CSS’ will also require resources to maintain. However, since it’s already at the max tier, supplying toolkits may be less important since there is no impact to upgrading. Keeping the CSS’ supplied with food will be critical as much of the crafting will occur there, at least initially.
Simply supplying the CSS with Food will likely be the easiest but most crowded starting action, as it can be done immediately with an import of Food from your wallet to the CSS. Each CSS and Starbase has a maximum ‘storage’ of the maintenance materials, however, so once it’s full, players will need to wait for some resources to be consumed before they can top it off again.
The following image was shared in a Star Atlas Brew (public community call):
This is work in progress and may change by the time Starbased launches. You can see in the current iteration some of the elements from an upgrade and maintenance perspective.
Loyalty Points Expenditure
Contributing as outlined above will provide you with LP. What the team has publicly confirmed is that it is up to each player to determine how much LP they want to ‘spend’ each epoch.
What this means is that a player can contribute through upgrading or maintaining Starbases, earn the LP, and then determine exactly how much LP to spend and how much LP to keep. This provides a degree of autonomy to the player in when they want to get a share of that epoch’s rewards.
This can open up some interesting strategies. For example, if a player earns LP over multiple days, one path would be to ‘spend’ their LP each epoch, and that would entitle them to a share of their faction’s 1.5 million ATLAS emissions for that epoch. The player could also hold on to the LP, and perhaps make a gamble that there will be a day where comparatively less players ‘spend’ their LP, and so by spending a larger amount of LP that day, they might secure a larger share of the ATLAS emissions. Of course, many others will be thinking the same thing, and so this can become an interesting game loop to strategize around.
In the future, spending LP may bring other benefits, which means it could also be a good idea to build up a bank of LP over time.
XP
With Starbased, the concept of XP will also go live in a v1 state. XP will be earned by many actions, including mining, crafting, warping, etc. XP will serve a greater purpose in the future, and isn’t specifically relevant right now to the manufacturing path, so we won’t go into too much detail. Suffice to say that being actively engaged in Starbased will bring you early-mover benefits in gaining XP.
Selling on the Star Atlas Marketplace
For manufacturers, while earning LP and spending them for a share of epoch rewards is indeed a new path, don’t forget that the Marketplace will still be alive and well. Those who don’t want to upgrade or maintain Starbases can still earn ATLAS by mining, manufacturing and selling on the Marketplace.
New Resources and Recipes
With Starbased, there will be the introduction of 3 new resources, along with 5 new recipes.
New Resources (Raw):
Nitrogen
Silica
Titanium Ore
New Recipes (Crafted):
Titanium: Crafted from Titanium Ore
Toolkits 3 and Frameworks 3: Crafted from Titanium
Aerogel: Crafted from Nitrogen and Silica
Field Stabilizers: Crafted from Aerogel and Crystal Lattice
While not yet confirmed, the new components will likely be used in higher tier Starbase upgrading.
Key Anticipated Manufacturing Strategies
With these changes coming in Starbased, let’s take a look at the different loops that will be possible for manufacturers, as well as some of the nuances around maximizing efficiency and profitability.
CSS Maintenance
While not exactly requiring manufacturing, CSS maintenance is likely the easiest (and most crowded) loop, since all it requires is importing the relevant R4 from your wallet, and you can immediately top up the CSS. This will be a good loop for those who may not have many transport ships.
Biomass & Iron Ore Sector Starbase Maintenance
A very simple manufacturing loop can be to mine Biomass and Iron Ore, turn that into Food and Toolkits respectively, and immediately contribute to the local Starbase maintenance pools. This means you can have your ships and crew at the same Starbase, and not have to worry too much about transportation.
General Starbase Maintenance
Next up in simplicity is shuttling relevant R4 out to sector Starbases, and contributing to the maintenance pools. If you’ve got Claim Stakes passively generating R4 and some ships for transportation, this might be a good easy option to get away from the potentially more crowded CSS, Biomass and Iron Ore maintenance loops. If you are making Food and Toolkits, then it can be a simple matter of shipping it out to other Starbases.
Crafting to Sell on the Star Atlas Marketplace
Not unlike today, crafting to sell on the Marketplace can still be a lucrative path, as it doesn’t put you at the mercy of local Starbase upgrade and maintenance cycles (and potentially being limited in what you can contribute). Keep in mind that you still need to transport everything to the CSS in order to list it on the Marketplace.
Note that in the image shared above, we can see a button for “Local Marketplace”, which would open up localized markets (allowing you to sell items directly at the sector Starbase). This would also help open up the logistics/transportation career. However, it has not been confirmed that this will be activated for Starbased at launch.
Starbase Upgrading with Locally Available Resources
With different resources going into different tiers of Starbases, we’ll likely see locally available production chains filling up downstream components first. For example, a sector that has Iron Ore and Copper Ore makes it very easy to mine and manufacturer Iron and Copper, which can then be turned into Electromagnets, a component in Starbase upgrades (at least as shown for a Tier 1 Starbase). You can then contribute Electromagnets (and crew) immediately.
Especially upon first launch of Starbased, these components that use materials all locally available in the same sector may be the most optimal to manufacture and contribute to upgrading.
General Starbase Upgrading
Of course, then the next step in complexity is just transporting resources and components around generally to any Starbase that needs it. Key here will be ensuring you monitor what components an upgrade still needs, so that your fleet doesn’t arrive too late for that particular upgrade action.
As Starbased rolls out, there will undoubtably be a period of Marketplace price fluctuations as the new LP-to-ATLAS mechanics are play out at a mass scale, and price discovery of every resource and component happens. Given that Starbased happens at the same time as the sunset of Faction Fleet (taking out a considerable amount of R4 expenditure from the ecosystem), everything will be recalculated by the free market in the first few weeks of Starbased.
We’re excited to see how Starbased unfolds, and we’ll be here with more strategies as things get confirmed and ironed out!
