Mesh Tile

Mesh Tile is a permeable building tile used to separate spaces without fully sealing them off. It lets sunlight pass through at full intensity while blocking other kinds of light, and it blocks decor. It also prevents gases and liquids from escaping when placed over exposed space in the Space Biome, making it useful for containing rooms, managing atmospheric leaks, and sealing open shafts without creating a solid barrier.

Because it is not a true solid tile, Mesh Tile has some unusual interactions with liquids and heat. If liquid inside a Mesh Tile condenses into a solid item, the item is pushed into the nearest open tile, following the clockwise priority pattern starting from the top-left tile. If there is too much liquid and a natural tile would form, that tile is created over the Mesh Tile and blocks it. In practice, this makes Mesh Tile a convenient way to handle very high heat sources with minimal infrastructure, since it can be used to control what happens when liquids or solids change state.

Mesh Tile is especially useful under buildings that spill liquids onto the floor during operation. Natural Gas Generator, Petroleum Generator, and Polymer Press can all be built on Mesh Tile so their output falls through the tile instead of flooding the area or requiring manual cleanup. This is one of the most common uses for the building in industrial setups.

A filled Mesh Tile can also behave like insulation when it contains vacuum. In that state, it can serve as a lightweight barrier between spaces without the mass of a solid tile. It is also important in heat exchange: Mesh Tile is treated as an entity, so it thermally interacts with both the gas or liquid inside it and the solid tile below it. This means it can transfer heat in ways that differ from ordinary construction tiles, and it can be part of efficient thermal management designs.

Practical uses include:

• Building over geysers, vents, and other open features where gas and liquid containment is needed without sealing off the entire space.
• Placing it beneath spill-prone buildings such as Natural Gas Generator, Petroleum Generator, and Polymer Press to route liquid output downward.
• Using it to contain heat or fluids in the Space Biome while still allowing sunlight through.
• Taking advantage of the vacuum-filled state as a lightweight insulating layer.
• Using it as a controlled release point for condensed material, since items are displaced into nearby open tiles rather than remaining trapped.

One important limitation is that Mesh Tile blocks decor, so it is not ideal in areas where room attractiveness matters. It also does not act like a normal solid floor for all purposes, so its thermal and fluid behavior should be considered carefully when designing bases, industrial rooms, or space-facing structures.