Mid Game Guide: Construction Drone Bay & Boiler/Turbine Tips

Mid game is the stage where your station shifts from survival and initial expansion into stable, repeatable production and larger projects: steady power generation, reliable resource lines, accelerated construction, and scalability for late-game objectives. This guide explains the common mid-game systems and upgrades you should prioritize and how to deploy them efficiently.

Construction and drone scaling

Construction speed becomes a bottleneck as module sizes and repair tasks grow. Construction Drone Bays are the primary method to scale build throughput.

• Each Construction Drone Bay upgrade increases the station's construction drone count by +25 drones per upgrade.
• Expected construction time scales inversely with drone count: doubling drones halves expected time. Example progression: 25 → 50 → 75 drones cuts a 48-minute task to 24 minutes then 16 minutes respectively.
• The "Improve Construction Drones" upgrade can be researched and applied repeatedly (infinite tiers). Each tier raises power requirements and resource cost, and yields diminishing returns because build time follows an inverse 1/x relation with drone count. Use additional tiers when large or urgent construction tasks justify the escalating cost.

Practical tips

• Plan major multi-module builds around drone-bay upgrades so you get the best time-to-completion for large repair/expansion events.
• If a single large repair or reactor rebuild is imminent, buy enough drone capacity to finish it during the desired window rather than many small, incremental upgrades.

Power generation and mid-game boilers

Mid game usually requires moving beyond basic generators to steady, high-output power setups. Steam Turbines paired with Boilers provide a scalable, continuous power solution.

• A single Steam Turbine needs 60 L/s of steam to operate at its maximum 3.6 MW output.
• One Boiler is capable of supplying 60 L/s of steam, so the canonical pairing is 1 Boiler per 1 Steam Turbine when you want full turbine output.
• A Boiler consumes heat/power to generate steam. To maintain the steam supply for full turbine output, the Boiler requires 3.6 MJ/s of energy input.

Fuel considerations for Boilers

• Different fuels provide different total energy and therefore different burn rates to sustain required steam generation. Use higher-energy fuels to reduce fuel handling frequency; lower-energy fuels are cheaper but consume more inventory throughput.
• Example fuels and relative characteristics:
  • Biomass (5 MJ): high throughput, short burn time — heavy logistics but common early-mid.
  • Ignium Ore Rubble (10 MJ) and Ignium Ore (12.5 MJ): intermediate energy density and throughput.
  • Portable Fuel (16 MJ): compact and easy to handle.
  • Ignium Fuel Rod (400 MJ): extremely long burn time and minimal handling, but requires specialized production or acquisition and yields casings.
  • Coked Ignium (5.5 MJ): similar to biomass in throughput with slightly higher energy per item.

Practical boiler/turbine layout tips

• Match boilers to turbines 1:1 for maximum consistent output; mismatching reduces utilization or wastes boiler throughput.
• Use higher-energy fuels for remote or hard-to-service generators to reduce refueling cycles.
• Factor in fuel logistics (storage, transfer, and automated refueling) when expanding the number of boiler/turbine pairs.

Prioritization and mid-game progression

• Prioritize drone-bay upgrades before or alongside major station expansions and reactor rebuilds to avoid long, interruptible construction windows.
• When adding power capacity, plan around Boiler–Steam Turbine pairs rather than stacking turbines on undersupplied steam or vice versa.
• Balance upgrade costs: repeated drone improvements give diminishing returns, and high-tier construction upgrades increase in power and material cost. Time-critical projects justify heavier investment.

Operational tips and common pitfalls

• Don’t over-invest in drone upgrades when you have only a few small tasks pending; invest incrementally and schedule large projects after a decisive upgrade.
• Avoid oversized boiler fleets fed by low-energy fuels unless you have robust logistics for fuel throughput; the maintenance burden can outstrip benefits.
• When switching fuels, verify burn time and throughput so that automation and refuelers are configured appropriately.

This mid-game checklist will keep your station building speed and power output aligned with expanding project demands: upgrade Construction Drone Bays in steps that match upcoming construction workloads, pair Boilers 1:1 with Steam Turbines for reliable 3.6 MW units, and choose fuels according to logistics capacity and desired refuel interval.