RogSarOorAld's Guide to RnD

[Balthusdire]

Hey everyone. Xantholne wrote an excellent guide for RnD that I have been using for a long long time. I want to give him all the credit because this guide is built entirely on his as a base. RnD has changed enough now that we need an updated guide so I am here to provide one! Thanks again to Xantholne for the hard work.

 

The first thing you want to do is go to sci chem. MONKEY EXPLOSION TIME!

1. Grab a beaker and make at least 10u of unstable mutagen (Chlorine-Radium-Plasma).
2. Get a monkey cube from the box (it has to be a cubed monkey, the one that starts there will NOT work for this) and rinse it in the sink. Currently cubed monkies don't work. I don't know if it is intentional but at least that is how it is. This same strategy works on the pre-spawned monkey now so just use that instead!
3. Get a syringe and fill it with 10u of mutagen.
4. You then want to double inject the monkey. Click on them repeatedly to make sure you are injecting in quick succession or this will not work. The first injection will humanize the monkey, the second will gib them.

BOOM! Monkey organs and guts everywhere. First thing is clean up the gibs with the space cleaner there (be nice to your co-workers) and then eat the eyeballs, it is not necessary to eat them but they are scrumptious so I highly recommend it. Grab the monkey heart and brain and head. When you are done grabbing it make a beaker of sulfuric acid (Sulfur-Oxygen-Hydrogen). Head on over to RnD! Let's get started!

 

Monkey Heart, from SCICHEM (Biotech: 5)
Monkey Brain, from SCICHEM (Biotech: 5)
Basic Capacitor, made in PROTOLATHE, AUTOLATHE (Power: 1)
Micro Manipulator, made in PROTOLATHE, AUTOLATHE (Materials: 1, Data: 1)
Basic Micro-Laser, made in PROTOLATHE, AUTOLATHE (Magnets: 1)
Toolbox, made in AUTOLATHE (Combat: 1)
Welding Tool, made in AUTOLATHE (Plasma: 1)
High-Capacity Power Cell, made in PROTOLATHE, AUTOLATHE, MECHFAB, PODFAB (Power: 2)

 

For all of these first objects they should be sitting around in RnD, use them.

 

Science Goggles, made in PROTOLATHE (Engineering: 1, Magnets: 2)
Advanced Capacitor, made in PROTOLATHE (Power: 3)
Advanced Scanning Module, made in PROTOLATHE (Magnets: 3)
Mass-Spectrometer, made in PROTOLATHE (Plasma: 2)
Advanced Reagent Scanner, made in PROTOLATHE (Magnets: 4, Plasma: 3)
Advanced Hard Disk Drive, made in PROTOLATHE (Data: 2, Engineering: 2
Tracking Beacon, made in PROTOLATHE (Bluespace: 1)
Global Positioning System, made in PROTOLATHE (Bluespace: 2, Materials: 2)
Holographic Sign Projector, made in PROTOLATHE (Data: 3)
Mining Drill, made in PROTOLATHE (Engineering: 3, Materials: 2)
Cluster Hard Disk Drive, made in PROTOLATHE (Data: 4, Engineering: 4)
Advanced Matter Bin, made in PROTOLATHE (Materials: 3)
Machine Board (SUPERPACMAN-type Generator), made in IMPRINTER (Power: 4)
Console Board (Telepad Control Console), made in IMPRINTER (Bluespace: 3, Plasma: 4)
Machine Board (Quantum Pad Board), made in IMPRINTER (Bluespace: 4)
Machine Board (Teleportation Hub), made in IMPRINTER (Materials: 4)

 

Make a RPED and fill it with 10 Supermatter Bins, 10 Pico Manipulators, 10 High Power Micro Lasers, 5 Advanced Scanning Modules, and 5 Advanced Capacitors. Upgrade all 3 RnD machines first. Upgrade the ORM. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED that you upgrade Xenobio too.

You need a screwdriver and can use a wrench for the shortcut. Screwdriver all 3 of your machines and apply the RPED to switch out the parts. Re-screwdriver them and make sure you sync with the database! Now head to cargo. You can either walk there like a pleb or take the disposals superhighway. To take disposals click and open the disposals interface window. Then click and drag yourself into disposals. WHILE THAT IS HAPPENING click the engaged button to flush the disposal, this will cause it to flush as soon as you are in. You'll fly through the pipes to cargo. Run over to the ORM and screwdriver it, apply RPED and screwdriver again. Now at this point either bug a cargo tech to let you out or you can wrench the orm to unsecure it and pull it out of the way. If you do move the ORM, you MUST MAKE SURE you put it back and WRENCH IT IN PLACE! If it gets stolen because you centcomm will send clown commandos to literally honk you to death. On your way back I recommend popping into medbay to upgrade the sleepers and cloning machine, but that is optional.

 

Security HUD, made in PROTOLATHE (Combat: 2)
Large Grenade, made in PROTOLATHE (Combat: 3)
Exosuit Board ("Gygax" Weapons & Targeting Control module), made in IMPRINTER (Combat: 4, Data: 4)

 

Chain of Command, from CAPTAINS OFFICE (Combat: 5)
or
Deathnettle, made in BOTANY (Combat: 5)
or
Combat Shotgun, ordered from CARGO (Combat: 5)

 

99/100 times you will use the Chain of Command, just ask the captain nicely. I have yet to have a Captain refuse to let us use it for RnD. Deathnettles depend on botany and good luck convincing security to give you a combat shotgun.

At this point you are stuck without minerals. You can go upgrade more things or give the clown some lube, whatever you feel like. When mining drops of materials, rush and get it. Diamonds are king here, you cant do too much without them but if you get silver you can make a Bluespace RPED which is excellent for upgrading.

 

Reviver implant, made in PROTOLATHE, MECHFAB (Materials: 5)
Bluespace Polycrystal, from MINING, (Bluespace: 6)
Bluespace Polycrystal, from MINING, (Bluespace: 6)
AI Module (Purge), made in IMPRINTER (Data: 5)
Diamond Mining Drill, made in PROTOLATHE (Materials: 6)

 

If you havent done so, build an Exosuit Fabricator.

 

P-X Tesla Cannon, Made in EXOSUIT FABRICATOR (Material 4, Engineering 4, Combat 6, Magnet 5)
P-X Tesla Cannon, Made in EXOSUIT FABRICATOR (Material 4, Engineering 4, Combat 6, Magnet 5)
Phazon Torso, made in EXOSUIT FABRICATOR (Plasma: 5)
Xray Laser Gun, made in PROTOLATHE (Illegals: 1)

 

At this point you should print out at least 30 of each top level machine components and upgrade the station (you'll want more matter bins and manipulators). You should be upgrading all RnD machines, Xenobio, Robotics INCLUDING THE CHARGERS, the Botany Machines, all the Kitchen stuff, everything in Medbay, the ORM and cargo Autolathe, BrigBay Sleeper, Pod Fabricator.

Print 10 Tech disks, take to Cargo after loading a tech level on every disk of different techs

 

Machine Prototype, ordered from CARGO (Engineering: 6)
Machine Prototype, ordered from CARGO (Engineering: 6)
Ambrosia Gaia from Botany or Sentient Slime Potion from Xenobio, Biological, 6
Glow-berries from botany or Yellow Slime Core from Xenobio, Power 6

 

TADA! There are a few more things that can happen, but I can't spoil everything. If you can get your hands on anything unusual see if it has levels. There are some cool hidden stuff you can get in very rare circumstances.

Edited June 15, 2018 by Balthusdire

[Vargh]

Nerd

[ID404NotFound]

As a captain, I have denied giving the chain of command, and instead gave my rapier.

In another guide it says the Bola Launcher from the mechfab gives combat 5, is that not true anymore?

[R1f73r]

No the bola launcher no longer gives combat 5

[Kyet]

A few thoughts:

• During the initial upgrade, you may want to upgrade R&D first, as I thought it makes printing more parts cheaper/faster.
• The most important upgrade for the ORM is the matter bin, because it multiplies the amount of minerals that ore gets processed into, resulting in dramatically more minerals. If you only have enough minerals to produce one top-tier matter bin, this is where it should go.
• Upgrading the exosuit fabs in robotics is also incredibly important - they will guzzle insane amounts of resources if you don't do this. Sync in R&D, then sync in the robotics lab, then sync on each individual exosuit fab. Not doing this wastes huge amounts of resources and prevents robotics building some high-tier parts. If you later increase tech levels / get more upgrades, you will have to repeat this process. If you are RD, make sure that robotics syncs then updates the fabs - half the time they don't and they waste minerals as a result.
• When upgrading medbay, make sure you upgrade the cloning area with at least phasic scanners, and use the cloning console to set 'autoprocess' to 'on'. Then drop the RPED, hop in the scanner, wait five seconds, and hop out. If you later die, the pod will automatically start cloning you, even without your body. Once you have set up autoclone, consider telling security, or at least Command, so they can use it too.
• If you are RD, you can upgrade the teleporter to make it calibrate instantly. That can be useful.
• A single sheet of uranium/diamond/etc can get you a materials level, and may be cheaper than making a component.

Once this list is finalized, do you mind if I add it to the R&D Tool, perhaps as Balthus-suggested? I've been meaning to add a new set of suggestions based on a more up-to-date R&D.

Be aware, though, that I recently updated the underlying R&D data and there have been almost no changes to it at all since last year, so as far as I am aware, the old dogbeast guide is still mostly accurate.

If there are any specific things in that guide which are wrong, please let me know.

[Balthusdire]

Thanks for the points! The old dogbeasts guide is outdated now on a few key points which is why I made this as an update. Add to whatever you want. Im just going to go over your points really quick

• Whoops, thats a mistake, you should of course upgrade RnD first, it is utterly vital.
• Definitely upgrade the bin first, but since the first upgrade takes just metal and glass you should pretty much never run out of materials for it.
• Robotics is a good upgrade to do, but I have found roboticists generally difficult to convince that they should let you in to upgrade. If they do, go for it, but dont waste time trying to convince them if they are being standoffish.
• The initial upgrade won't have phasics but that doesn't mean dont do it. The upgrade to the sleepers is hugely beneficial and it does help cloning.
• Teleporter upgrades make me swoon.
• The items in the list are picked because they are cheaper than single sheets so I would recommend just using the list.

A question though, do you know how to remove the double space formatting? I don't like it but damned if I can find a way to fix it. It just wont do it.

[Balthusdire]

Thanks so much!