Guide to Hydroponics
Hydroponics and the Botanists who work there are important to the station, especially in longer rounds. Botanists grow plants that the Chef can use for food. Without Botany, the station will have to live off of beef jerky and space twinkies, or starve to death. Hydroponic plants are also useful for RnD, Cargo, and the crew aside from food. Grinding plants to create biomass can be very useful for someone needing a snappy toolbelt or boots.
The job is not too difficult, but getting set up can be a tad overwhelming at first, especially when you get many requests, so here's A to-do-List to get you started and help you set up your area to make it all more manageable.
Departmental Head
Head of Personnel
Guide to Food • | Guide to Drinks • | Hydroponics • | Station Economy • | Guide to the Library • | Service SOP |
Basics of Botany
Botany Fundamentals
The fundementals of botany can be boiled down to 4 tasks:
- Mutate plants to get good stats, new species with useful chems and traits, and new random traits.
- Extract the trait, stat or chem genes to disks Using the Plant DNA Manipulator.
- Combine different genes to create all sorts of useful, bountiful plant, once again using the Plant DNA Manipulator.
- Keep your plants alive by refilling the nutrient and water tank and also removing weeds and pests.
Do these well and you'll have a very quick and easy setup, giving you plenty of time to experiment with all sorts of fun plants.
Trays
Indicator Lights
Plants require nutriment and water to grow. They are also bothered by pests and weeds. Trays come equipped with alerts that flash specific colors to tell you what's happening with your plant.
From left to right -
- Green: Ready to harvest.
- Red: Low health.
- Red: Weeds/pests/toxins.
- Yellow: Low nutriment.
- Blue: Low water.
Irrigation
Trays can also be connected via irrigation pipes that behave as such:
- If the amount of reagents transferred to the tray is 30u or lower the irrigation system isn't set off and all reagents are transferred to the tray being targeted.
- If the amount of reagents transferred to the tray is over 30u it is divided equally between all connected trays.
Botanical Tools
Tools that are of use in botany -
- Wrench: Used to move your trays around.
- Wirecutters: Used to set up the irrigation system. If 30u or more of water is put into trays while the irrigation is set up, water will be shared across trays. This will also distribute things like mutagen and plant killer.
- Hatchet: Chops tower-caps into planks, chops other things. This is also a very robust tool that can be hidden in backpacks.
- Spade: Used to remove unwanted or dead plants from your trays.
- Cultivator: Kills Weeds.
- Plant Bag: Collects up to 50 items or 100 seeds from your harvest.
- Portable Seed Extractor: Found in the lockers of the back room, this can harvest and pick up plants and turn up to 100 plants into seeds. Can be alt-clicked to turn the contained plants into seed.
- Plant analyzer: Gives information about plants and seeds and is the best tool for sorting seeds.
- Seed Sorting Tray: Not as good at sorting as the plant analyzer, but better than sorting by hand.
Plants 101
Take some seeds from the vendor and put them into the trays. Make sure to keep them weeded with a cultivator and watered. Some plants have a varied growth times, such as wheat growing faster while watermelons or apple trees take a little longer before you can harvest from them. Sometimes these and other stats of a plant are affected if you ignore them after the light warns you of their status. You have a choice of 5 nutriments, depending on if you hacked your machine or not. Once your tray flashes green, you're set to harvest. If you want to replicate the plant to continue growing more, just insert it into the seed extractor.
Sorting Seeds
If you grow your seeds in a tray with a mutation level of 0 they will not mutate, and thus will be all the same. However, when the mutation level is greater than zero the seeds may be different, and thus need to be sorted. These seeds can't be planted or put into the seed extractor.
Seed sorting is done in one of 3 ways:
- Plant Analyzer: Use the plant analyzer on a container holding seeds, such as a plant bag or portable seed extractor. This takes half a second per seed and gives a mutation boost of 50% after the 4th consecutive seed sorter and 100% after the 8th one.
This means that for the most mutations you want to sort as many seeds at once. - Seed Sorting Tray: A dedicated seed container for sorting. Half as fast as the analyzer and only gives a bonus of 50% for seeds past the 4th.
- Using in hand: One seed pack at a time, one second each. You can't sort seeds consecutively so there's no bonus.
Biogenerators
The bio-generator makes items out of the nutriment in plants, such as watermelons and pumpkins which have a 20% nutriment boost trait. To get biomass, grab a spare bucket and equip the machine with it then put your growns inside. Open its interface and process the plants. If you somehow run out of nutriment in the vendors, remember you can print the three standard nutriments here. You can recycle any plant, though if they don't have nutriment like bananas, the efficiency is very low.
DNA Manipulator
This allows you to extract genes and stats from seeds. This is a very useful machine for mass producing plants, easily saving lots of time.
How to use:
- 1. Go to the locker in the back and take out the box of plant data disks.
- 2. Load a disk into the machine along with any seed of choice.
- 3. Extract a stat, trait or reagent gene to the disk (seed will be destroyed) or extract all of the core stats(seed is also destroyed, and it requires extracting multiple seeds with the same exact stats).
- 4. Put in another seed.
- 5. You can now modify the seed's stats and genes based on what's in the disk.
Useful seeds for lowest(best) production speed:
- Wheat has 30 potency and 1 production speed, and some stations have some laying around in addition to the seeds in the vendor.
- Treecaps have naturally high endurance and resistance, as well as 50 potency and 1 production speed.
- At the start the DNA modifier can only store 50 potency on a disk, but it can create all-stat-core disks without a limit on each stats' values. this allows you to create a 50 potency 1 production all-stat-core disk early on which you can improve later.
Don't forget that you can rename seed packs with a pen to keep track of your modified seeds!
Plants
There are three types of plants. The biggest category is "normal plants". The much smaller ones are mushrooms and weeds. They are a little different from the normal plants:
- Mushrooms need less light, and suffer less from lack of it.
- Mushrooms don't need water to grow. They still use it, though.
- Weeds don't suffer from high weed level.
- Mushrooms and weeds can't be overtaken by weeds in a tray.
- Mushrooms' yield can't drop to 0. It will always be at least 1.
In addition to those types, some individual plants have their own unique features that aren't bound to a trait:
- You can carve a pumpkin with a hatchet. Carved pumpkins can be worn and you can toggle them to emit a weak light.
- You can carve a corn cob (eaten ear of corn) with a hatchet to make a smoking pipe.
- Wheat can be used to feed chickens in the Hydroponics near the kitchen (just give them wheat directly) for them to lay eggs.
- You can carve a carrot with a hatchet to make a shiv. It's not very strong but it's good at slicing things.
- Flowers and ambrosia can be worn on your head. Works nicely with Strong Bioluminescense.
- Add dried ambrosia, wheat, tea aspera tips or tobacco leaves to a tower cap log to make a torch.
- Novaflowers ignite people you hit them with and deal burn damage depending on potency.
- Death-Nettles will sting when picked up without protective gloves, stunning and dealing burn damage. They will also deal burn damage on hit, which gets lower with each hit.
- Comfrey and Aloe can be crushed to make healing poultices that apply the plant's reagents to the skin.
- Combustible lemons can be armed and thrown like grenades and create a fiery explosion after a 5 second delay, be responsible with them.
- Killer Tomatos will wake up and start attacking anything in sight after being used in hand. If the liquid contents trait wasn't removed they will squish when you throw them and will not wake up, so you would need to drop them instead.
- Grass and Carpet Grass can be used in hand to make Grass or Carpet tiles.
- Replica pod can be used to grow dead people back to life. To clone someone, follow these simple steps:
- Take a blood sample from the body using a syringe.
- Inject it into the bag of seeds.
- Plant the seeds.
- Let the plant grow and harvest it. The person will come back as a Diona.
Trays, whether empty or occupied by plants, can be occasionally overtaken by a weed if their level is 5 or more. In that case the old plant is destroyed, and a new one will sprout in its place. Possible plants include:
- 1/6 chance for Reishi.
- 1/9 chance for Nettle.
- 1/9 chance for Harebell.
- 1/9 chance for Amanita.
- 1/9 chance for Chanterelle.
- 1/9 chance for Tower Cap.
- 1/9 chance for Plump Helmets.
- 1/6 chance for Starthistle.
Here's a chart for reference on what you can grow.
Plant Chart (mouse over the reagents to have a brief effect description)
Name | Type | Seed | Potting | Product | Reagent Production | Traits | Available from | Mutates into | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Aloe | Normal | 20% silver sulfadiazine | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | |||||
Ambrosia cruciatus | Normal | 10% plant-matter, 30% tetrahydrocannabinol, 20% bicaridine, 30% kelotane, 20% bath salts | Perennial Growth | Traitor uplink only | |||||
Ambrosia deus | Normal | 10% plant-matter, 30% diluted omnizine, 30% synaptizine, 20% space drugs, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | Mutate Ambrosia vulgaris | Ambrosia gaia | ||||
Ambrosia gaia | Normal | 12% nutriment, 10% earthsblood, 10% vitamin | Mutate Ambrosia deus | ||||||
Ambrosia vulgaris | Normal | 10% plant-matter, 20% bicaridine, 20% kelotane, 30% space drugs, 20% toxin, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | Ambrosia deus | ||||
Apple | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor, mutate Pineapple | Gold apple | ||||
Bamboo | Normal | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | ||||||
Banana | Normal | 20% banana juice, 20% potassium, 8% vitamin, 4% plant-matter | Slippery Skin, Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor, Exotic Seeds Crate | Mimana, Bluespace banana | ||||
Berry | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor, Seeds Crate | Glow-berry, Poison-berry | ||||
Blood Tomato | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 40% blood, 8% vitamin | Liquid Contents, Perennial Growth | Mutate Tomato | Killer tomato | ||||
Bluespace Banana | Normal | 40% singulo, 20% banana juice, 8% vitamin, 4% nutriment | Slippery Skin, Bluespace Activity, Perennial Growth | Mutate Banana | |||||
Bluespace tomato | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 40% singulo, 40% space lube, 8% vitamin | Slippery Skin, Bluespace Activity, Liquid Contents, Perennial Growth | Mutate Blue tomato | |||||
Blue cherry | Normal | 14% nutriment, 14% sugar | Perennial Growth | Mutate Cherry | |||||
Blue tomato | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 40% space lube, 8% vitamin | Slippery Skin, Perennial Growth | Mutate Tomato | Bluespace tomato | ||||
Blumpkin | Normal | 40% Ammonia, 20% Chlorine, 40% Plant-Matter, 20% Plasma | Perennial Growth | Mutate Pumpkin | |||||
Bungo Fruit | Normal | 10% Bungo Juice, 10% Nutriment, 10% Universal Enzyme | Perennial Growth | Mutate Cocoa | |||||
Cabbage | Normal | 20% Plant-Matter, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | Replica pod | ||||
Cannabis | Normal | 30% tetrahydrocannabinol, Cannabidiol 30% | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor (hacked) | Rainbow weed, Lifeweed, | ||||
Carpet | Normal | 4% plant-matter, 10% hydrogen | Perennial Growth | Mutate Grass | |||||
Carrot | Normal | 10% plant-matter, 8% vitamin, 50% oculine | MegaSeed Servitor, Seeds Crate | Parsnip | |||||
Chanterelle | Mushroom | 20% nutriment | Fungal Vitality | MegaSeed Servitor, Seeds Crate, can overtake a tray | |||||
Cherry | Normal | 14% nutriment, 14% sugar | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | Blue cherry | ||||
Cherry Bomb | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 20% sugar, 140% blackpowder | Perennial Growth | Only available from Xenobiology | |||||
Chili | Normal | 8% plant-matter, 50% capsaicin, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | Ghost chili, Chilly Pepper | ||||
Cocoa | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 50% cocoa powder | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | Vanilla, Bungo Fruit | ||||
Comfrey | Normal | 20% styptic powder | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | |||||
Coffee arabica | Normal | 20% coffee grounds, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | Coffee robusta | ||||
Coffee robusta | Normal | 20% coffee grounds, 8% vitamin, 20% ephedrine | Perennial Growth | Mutate Coffee arabica | |||||
Combustible Lemon | Normal | 10% plant-matter | Perennial Growth | Mutate Lemon | |||||
Corn | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 40% corn oil, 8% vitamin | MegaSeed Servitor, Seeds Crate | Snapcorn | |||||
Durathread | Normal | Mutate Cotton | |||||||
Death berry | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 16% coniine,20% tirizene, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | Mutate Poison-berry | |||||
Death nettle | Weed | 50% fluorosulphuric acid, 50% sulphuric acid | Perennial Growth, Weed Adaptation, Hypodermic Prickles | Mutate Nettle, weed mutation | |||||
Deathweed | Normal | 70% cyanide, 30% tetrahydrocannabinol, Cannabidiol 30% | Perennial Growth | Mutate Cannabis | |||||
Destroying angel | Mushroom | 8% nutriment, 8% Psilocybin, 40% amanitin | Fungal Vitality | Mutate Fly amanita | |||||
Cotton | Normal | MegaSeed Servitor | |||||||
Eggplant | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor, Seeds Crate | Egg-plant | ||||
Egg-plant | Normal | 20% nutriment | Perennial Growth | Mutate Eggplant, Exotic Seeds Crate | |||||
Fly amanita | Mushroom | 70% amanitin, 8% Psilocybin, 20% growth serum, 8% nutriment | Fungal Vitality | MegaSeed Servitor (hacked), Exotic Seeds Crate, can overtake a tray | Destroying angel | ||||
Fruiting cactus | Normal | 16% Vitrium Froth, 8% nutriment, 8% vitamin | Fire Resistance | Lavaland Plant | |||||
Fungus | Mushroom | 70% space fungus | Fungal Vitality | MegaSeed Servitor (hacked), can overtake a tray | |||||
Garlic | Normal | 30% garlic juice, 20% plant matter | MegaSeed Servitor | ||||||
Gatfruit | Normal | 20% sulphur, 20% carbon, 14% nitrogen, 10% potassium | Perennial Growth | Only available from Xenobiology | |||||
Geranium | Normal | 10% plant-matter, 40% bicaridine | Mutate Poppy | ||||||
Glow-berry | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 50% uranium, 40% iodine, 8% vitamin. | Strong Bioluminescence, Perennial Growth | Mutate Berry | |||||
Ghost chili | Normal | 8% plant-matter, 110% capsaicin, 60% condensed capsaicin | Perennial Growth | Mutate Chili | |||||
Glowshroom | Mushroom | 20% radium, 20% phosphorus, 8% nutriment. | Bioluminescence, Fungal Vitality | MegaSeed Servitor | Glowcap Shadowshroom | ||||
Shadowshroom | Mushroom | 40% radium, 8% nutriment. | Shadow Emission, Fungal Vitality | Mutate Glowshroom |
| ||||
Glowcap | Mushroom | 20% teslium. Restores up to 100% battery charge. | Electrical Activity, Bioluminescence, Fungal Vitality | Mutate Glowshroom | |||||
Gold apple | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 40% gold, 8% vitamin | Mutate Apple | ||||||
Grapes | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 20% sugar, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | Green grapes | ||||
Grass | Normal | 4% plant-matter, 10% hydrogen | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | Carpet | ||||
Green grapes | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 40% kelotane, 20% sugar, 8% vitamin | Mutate Grapes | ||||||
Harebell | Weed | 8% plant-matter | Weed Adaptation | Can overtake a a tray | |||||
Holymelon | Normal | 40% holy water, 8% vitamin, 20% nutriment | Perennial Growth | Mutate Watermelon | |||||
Chilly Pepper | Normal | 4% plant-matter, 50% frost oil, 4% vitamin | Perennial Growth | Mutate Chili | |||||
Killer tomato | Normal | 20% protein, 8% vitamin | Liquid Contents | Mutate Blood Tomato | |||||
Koibean | Normal | 10% plant-matter, 20% carpotoxin, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | Mutate Soybean | |||||
Kudzu | Weed | 4% nutriment, 8% charcoal | Perennial Growth, Weed Adaptation | Weed mutation | |||||
Leafy mushroom | Normal | 12% nutriment, 16% Vitrium Froth, 8% nicotine | Fire Resistance, Fungal Vitality | Lavaland Plant | |||||
Lemon | Normal | 10% plant-matter, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | Combustible Lemon | ||||
Lettuce | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | |||||
Liberty-cap | Mushroom | 4% nutriment, 8% Psilocybin | Fungal Vitality | MegaSeed Servitor (hacked), Exotic Seeds Crate, weed mutation | |||||
Lifeweed | Normal | 70% omnizine, 30% tetrahydrocannabinol, Cannabidiol 30% | Perennial Growth | Mutate Cannabis | Deathweed,Omega weed | ||||
Lily | Normal | 10% plant-matter, 40% bicaridine | Perennial Growth | Mutate Poppy | |||||
Lime | Normal | 10% plant-matter, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor, mutate Orange | Orange | ||||
Large mushroom | Normal | 12% sugar, 8% ethanol, 12% stabilizing agent, 4% mint toxin | Fire Resistance, Fungal Vitality | Lavaland Plant | |||||
Meatwheat | Normal | 8% protein | Mutate Wheat | ||||||
Mimana | Normal | 20% nothing, 20% capulettium plus, 4% nutriment | Slippery Skin, Perennial Growth | Mutate Banana | Mimana, Bluespace banana | ||||
Mint | Normal | 6% mint, 6% plant-matter | MegaSeed Servitor | ||||||
Moonflower | Normal | 4% plant-matter, 4% vitamin, 40% moonshine | Mutate Sunflower | ||||||
Nettle | Weed | 30% wasabi | Perennial Growth, Weed Adaptation | MegaSeed Servitor (hacked), Exotic Seeds Crate, can overtake a tray | Death nettle | ||||
Novaflower | Normal | 50% condensed capsaicin, 60% capsaicin, 8% vitamin | Mutate Sunflower | ||||||
Numerous mushroom | Normal | 8% Tinea Luxor, 4% vitamin, 4% space drugs | Fire Resistance, Fungal Vitality, Bioluminescence | Lavaland Plant | |||||
Oat | Normal | 8% plant-matter | Mutate Wheat | ||||||
Olive | Normal | 40% plant-matter, 4% vitamin, 40% salt | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | |||||
Omega weed | Normal | 10% space drugs, 10% lysergic acid diethylamide, 10% mercury, 10% lithium, 10% haloperidol, 10% methamphetamine, 10% tetrahydrocannabinol, Cannabidiol 10% 10% Suicider, 10% hairgrowinium, 10% bath salts, 10% itching powder, 10% crank, 10% krokodil, 10% histamine, 10% psilocybin, 10% ectoplasm | Perennial Growth | Lifeweed,Rainbow Weed | |||||
Onion | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 8% vitamin | MegaSeed Servitor | ||||||
Orange | Normal | 10% plant-matter, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor, mutate Lime | Lime | ||||
Parsnip | Normal | 10% vitamin, 10% plant-matter | Mutate Carrot | ||||||
Peanuts | Normal | 20% plant-matter | MegaSeed Servitor | ||||||
Pineapple | Normal | 40% plant-matter, 4% vitamin, 8% water | Capacitive Cell Production | MegaSeed Servitor, Seeds Crate | Apple | ||||
Plum | Normal | 10% nutriment, 4% vitamin, 10% plant-matter | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | |||||
Plump helmet | Mushroom | 20% nutriment, 8% vitamin | Fungal Vitality | MegaSeed Servitor (hacked), Exotic Seeds Crate, can overtake a tray | Walking mushroom | ||||
Poison-berry | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 30% cyanide, 40% tirizene, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | Mutate Berry | Death berry | ||||
Poppy | Normal | 10% plant-matter, 40% bicaridine | MegaSeed Servitor | Geranium, Lily | |||||
Potato | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 8% vitamin | Capacitive Cell Production | MegaSeed Servitor, Seeds Crate | Sweet Potato | ||||
Pumpkin | Normal | 40% plant-matter, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | Blumpkin | ||||
Rainbow weed | Normal | 30% lysergic acid diethylamide, 30% tetrahydrocannabinol, 30% happiness, Cannabidiol 30% | Perennial Growth | Mutate Cannabis | Omega weed,Deathweed, | ||||
Redbeet | Normal | 10% plant-matter, 10% vitamin | Densified Chemicals | Mutate White beet | |||||
Red Onion | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 8% vitamin, 10% onion juice | Mutate Onion | ||||||
Rice | Normal | 8% plant-matter | MegaSeed Servitor | ||||||
Reishi | Mushroom | 70% charcoal, 70% morphine, 8% nutriment | Fungal Vitality | MegaSeed Servitor (hacked), can overtake a tray | |||||
Replica pod | Normal | MegaSeed Servitor, Exotic Seeds Crate, Mutate Cabbage | |||||||
Snapcorn | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 40% corn oil, 8% vitamin | Mutate Corn | ||||||
Soybean | Normal | 10% plant-matter, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor, Seeds Crate | Koibean | ||||
Space tobacco | Normal | 6% plant-matter, 16% nicotine, 10% salbutamol | Mutate Tobacco | ||||||
Starthistle | Weed | Weed Adaptation | Can overtake a tray | ||||||
Steelcap | Mushroom | 100% iron | Fungal Vitality | Mutate Towercap | |||||
Sugarcane | Normal | 50% sugar | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor, Seeds Crate | |||||
Sunflower | Normal | 16% corn oil, 8% plant-matter | MegaSeed Servitor, Seeds Crate | Moonflower, Novaflower | |||||
Sweet Potato | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 20% sugar, 20% vitamin | Mutate Potato | ||||||
Tall mushroom | Normal | 8% lysergic acid diethylamide, 16% Entropyc Polypnium, 8% Psilocybin | Fire Resistance, Fungal Vitality | Lavaland Plant | |||||
Tea aspera | Normal | 20% ground tea leaves, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | Tea astra | ||||
Tea astra | Normal | 20% ground tea leaves, 20% synaptizine, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | Mutate Tea aspera | |||||
Tobacco | Normal | 6% nicotine, 6% plant-matter | MegaSeed Servitor | Space tobacco | |||||
Tomato | Normal | 20% plant-matter, 8% vitamin | Liquid Content, Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor, Seeds Crate | Blood Tomato, Blue Tomato | ||||
Towercap | Mushroom | 40% carbon | Fungal Vitality | MegaSeed Servitor, can overtake a tray | Steelcap | ||||
Vanilla | Normal | 50% vanilla, 20% plant-matter | Perennial Growth | Mutate Cocoa | |||||
Walking mushroom | Mushroom | 30% nutriment, 10% vitamin | Fungal Vitality | Mutate Plump helmet | |||||
Watermelon | Normal | 40% plant-matter, 40% water, 8% vitamin | Perennial Growth | MegaSeed Servitor | Holymelon | ||||
Wheat | Normal | 8% plant-matter | MegaSeed Servitor, Seeds Crate | Oat, Meatwheat | |||||
White beet | Normal | 10% plant-matter, 40% sugar, 8% vitamin | MegaSeed Servitor | Redbeet |
Chemicals
Certain chemicals can affect your plants in various ways; from healing your plants, changing its stats, or just killing it outright. You'll likely need to ask Chemistry for help in obtaining some of these chemicals.
Chemical Chart; Effects are per unit. Hover over the names of chemicals to find where they are obtained.
Name | Purpose | Nutrients | Water | Health | Toxin | Bonus Effects |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
E-Z Nutriment | Fertilizer | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Does not increase mutation level. |
Mutriment | Fertilizer | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Increases mutation level by 10 |
Left 4 Zed | Fertilizer | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Increases mutation level by 15,but reduces the yield of each harvest to 1(no effect on the yield stat). |
Robust Harvest | Fertilizer | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Does not increase mutation level. Increases yield by 30%. |
Earthsblood | Fertilizer | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Does not increase mutation level., makes the tray self sustain after 28u were added. |
Unstable Mutagen | Mutations | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Inceases mutation level by 1 per 1u added, up to 15. |
Uranium | Mutations | 0 | 0 | -1 | 2 | Inceases mutation level by 1 per 1u added, up to 15. Poisons the tray |
Radium | Mutations | 0 | 0 | -1 | 3 | Inceases mutation level by 1 per 1u added, up to 15. Poisons the tray |
Ammonia | Stats | 1 | 0 | 0.5 | 0 | Increases Yield mutations. |
Diethylamine | Stats | 2 | 0 | 1 | 0 | Kills Pests. Increases Production Speed mutations. |
Saltpetre | Stats | 0 | 0 | 0.25 | 0 | Increases Potency mutations. |
Cryoxadone | Stats | 0 | 0 | 3 | -3 | Increases Endurance Mutations |
Omnizine | Stats | 0 | 0 | 3 | -3 | Increases Lifespan Mutations |
Saline Glucose Solution | Stats | 0 | 0 | 3 | -3 | Increases Weed Vulnurability and Weed Grow Rate Mutations |
Atrazine | Weed Killer | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0.5 | Kills Weeds. Commonly known as Weed Killer. |
Pest Killer | Pest Killer | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0.5 | Kills Pests. |
Water | Water | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | |
Holy Water | Water | 0 | 1 | 0.1 | 0 | |
Soda Water | Water | 0.1 | 1 | 0.1 | 0 | |
Fish Water | Water/Fertilizer | 0.75 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Increases nutrient level without changing nutrient type |
Milk | Water | 0.1 | 0.9 | 0 | 0 | |
Beer | Water | 0.25 | 0.7 | -0.05 | 0 | |
Nutriment | Fertilizer | 1 | 0 | 0.5 | 0 | Increases nutrient level without changing nutrient type |
Plant-matter | Fertilizer | 1 | 0 | 0.5 | 0 | Increases nutrient level without changing nutrient type |
Ash | Fertilizer | 0.5 | 0 | 0.25 | 0 | Kills Weeds and Heals plants |
Charcoal | Healing | 0 | 0 | 0 | -2 | |
Sugar | Plant Killer | 0.1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Creates weeds and pests. |
Blood | Fertilizer | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Creates pests. |
Virus Food | Fertilizer | 0.5 | 0 | -0.5 | 0 | Increases nutrient level without changing nutrient type |
Phosphorus | Plant Killer | 0.1 | -0.5 | -0.75 | 0 | Kills weeds (along with your plant). |
Toxin | Plant Killer | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | |
Sulphuric Acid | Plant Killer | 0 | 0 | -1 | 1.5 | Kills Weeds (along with your plant). |
Chlorine | Plant Killer | 0 | -0.5 | -1 | 1.5 | Kills weeds (along with your plant). |
Fluorine | Plant Killer | 0 | -0.5 | -2 | 2.5 | Kills weeds (along with your plant). |
Fluorosulphuric Acid | Plant Killer | 0 | 0 | -2 | 3 | Kills Weeds (along with your plant). |
Glyphosate | Plant Killer | 0 | 0 | -5 | 6 | Efficient against Kudzu. |
Napalm | Plant Killer | 0 | 0 | -6 | 7 | Kills Weeds (along with your plant). |
Lazarus Reagent | Evil | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | Creates hostile plant-life. |
Modifying Your Plants
Maybe you want to grow something more impressive than the tiny potatoes your plants probably produced. Or perhaps you got unlucky and harvested only one of each. A plant's stats determine all this and more, and true botanists are unafraid to PLAY GOD and change them!
Mutations
Plants mutate each harvest cycle, mutating more strongly the higher the mutation level of the tray. Those mutations only show up in the seeds, however, so those must be extracted, then sorted.
The strength of a plants mutations, meaning the extent to which stats can change as well as the chance for it to change species or gain a new random trait is governed by mutation level which you can see by using a plant analyzer on a tray or soil plot.
There are a few mutation level thresholds to be aware of:
- Above a mutation level of 10, the final seed may become a different species, with higher levels increasing the chance.
- Above a mutation level of 20, a random trait may be added to the final seed, with higher levels increasing the chance.
- Above a mutation level of 30, the final seed will always become a different species if possible.
It's important to mention that those are applicable for the 9th seed sorted and onwards when using a seed analyzer. For sorting in hand these are doubled, meaning you can't get new traits, and with a seed sorting tray they are 15, 30 and 45 respectively.
Mutation level can be increased in a few ways:
- Fertilizers: E-Z Nutriment, Robust Harvest and Earthsblood do not increase mutation level, Mutriment increases mutation level by 10 and Left 4 Zed increases it by 15. It's important to note that Left 4 Zed also reduces yield to 1(this doesn't affect the stat, only the actual yield).
- Mutagens: Each tray or soil plot has a mutagen tank that increases mutation level by the amount of mutagen stored in it. The tank can be filled with Unstable Mutagen, Radium or Uranium. Each fill the mutagen tank by 1 per 1u when added to the tray. The tank also loses 1 mutagen each harvest cycle
- Floral Somatoray: Will give +5 mutation level for one harvest.
Stats
- Age: Age of the plant, measured in cycles. Can be used to determine how a close a plant is to maturation or the next harvest. If it exceeds the plant's lifespan the plant starts taking damage each cycle
- Potency: The most important stat. Between 0 and 100. Basically, this determines plant power. Mostly affects the amount of chemicals in the plant, though some have additional effects, such as stun length for bananas. To get the amount of a given chemical in a plant, multiply the reagent in the chart by the potency: for example, 10% nutriment will be 5 nutriment at 50 potency.
- Yield: How much product you get each harvest. Between 0 and 10. Pay attention to this, because if it drops to 0, you won't harvest anything.
- Production Speed: How fast your plant reaches harvest. Between 1 and 10—the lower the faster. The plant has to wait (Production Speed) age cycles before each harvest.
- Endurance: Max health. Between 10 and 100. Not very useful, unless you leave your garden often. Only truely relevant for Killer Tomatos
- Lifespan: When the age is above lifespan, the plant starts losing health. Between 10 and 100. Not important at all in plants that can only be harvested once, unless they die before harvest. Barely useful for the other ones, because you can always plant it again.
- Maturation Speed: Age cycles before the plant can start production. The first harvest will be (Maturation Speed + Production Speed).
- Weed vulnerability: The chance that weeds will grow each cycle. Goes from 0 to 100. With 100 being 100% chance of weeds growing and 0 being 0%.
- Weed Growth Rate: The amount weeds grow by when they do. Goes from 0 to 10, with 10 completely filling a tray with weeds and potentially causing an immediate overtake and 0 meaning weeds don't grow at all.
Traits
Some plants have special traits, that can be tranferred through the Plant DNA Manipulator.
- Bioluminescence: Causes the plant to glow, emitting light at a radius of 1.4 + 3% of potency and a strength of 4% of potency.
- Bluespace Activity: Gives the plant bluespace properties, making it teleport people hit if the plant has Liquid Contents, and on slip if it has Slippery Skin.
- Capacitive Cell Production: Plants with this trait can be made into batteries with the addition of wire. Electrical Activity increases the cell's maximum charge twenty fold.
- Densified Chemicals: Doubles the reagent capacity of the plant. Has no direct effect on the amount of reagents being produced.
- Electrical Activity: Gives the plant electrical charge, making it recharge batteries when eaten; it will also have a chance equal to 20% of potency to electrocute on slip if it also has Slippery Skin and on squish if it has Liquid Contents.
- Fungal Vitality: The plant acquires mushroom-like properties, making it not need light or water.
- Gaseous Decomposition: Plants with this trait emit a smoke cloud when squashed, spewing reagents everywhere. Reagents are both breathed and applies to the skin immediately upon entering the gas cloud and are divided equally among all mobs present in it. Requires Liquid Contents to work.
- Hypodermic Prickles: Plants with this trait will sting when thrown, transferring a portion of their chemicals equal to 20% of potency to the target.
- Liquid Contents: Causes the plant to squash when thrown, applying the reagents inside on the target and destroying the plant.
- Perennial Growth: Plants with this trait can be harvested more than once.
- Shadow Emission: Causes the plant to emit slightly purple shadows at a radius of 1.4 + 4% of potency and a strength of 0.02% of potency.
- Slippery Skin: Causes the plant, or any products of the plant, to become slippery. The stun time is (Potency * 0.08), divided by 3 unless the plant has lube or is a banana. Maximum stun is 7 seconds.
- Strong Bioluminescence: Causes the plant to glow, emitting light in a radius of 1.4 + 5% of potency and a strength of 6% of potency.
- Weed Adaptation: The plant acquires weed-like properties, making it not need nutrients and immune to weeds in the tray.
Increasing Stats
Disks
Any stat can be stored on a disk which can be used in the DNA Manipulator to replace the same stat on any seed.
The best and most important type of stat disk, however, is the core stat disk, which is created by extracting all core stas of a plant(aside from maturation) to a single disk. This requires multiples copies of seeds with the exact same stats and does not have any limit on the stat values,
meaning you can get perfect stats without any upgrades to your machines. The core stat disk is your primary way of getting good stats on your plants so you want to get one with 100 potency, 1 production and 10 yield as soon as you can.
There are 21 disks in the botany lockers at shift start and more can be made by RnD in case you run out.
Stat Mutation Increasing Chemicals
To make your core stat disk you will need seeds with the stas you need. Most stats, however, can only be modified by mutations, which are random. And while we can and do mutate many plants to pick the best ones there is also a way to focus on one specific stat at a time.
A tray or soil plot can be doped with one of 6 chemicals. Each increases the amplitude of mutation for a certain stat, and halves it for the others. Doping a tray with any reagent will override the previous one. Additionally charcoal will remove the doping agent from a tray.
The doping chemicals for each stat are:
- Potency: Saltpetre
- Production Speed: Diethylamine
- Yield: Ammonia
- Endurance: Cryoxadone
- lifespan: Omnizine
- Weed Growth rate And Weed vulnerabiliity: Saline Glucose Solution
Creating a Core Stat Disk
The general way of imporving stats in this manner is as follows:
- Plant a plant with starting stats of your choosing in a tray or plot with a mutation level of 0. This is done to replicate your current best stats each time.
- Harvest and extract seeds
- Plant enough seeds so that a full harvest of all resulting plants will fill a plant bag with seeds. Preferably use trays or plots with a high mutation level and the appropriate doping chem.
- Sort the seeds, preferably using an analyzer.
- Take the best seed and plant it in place of the first one. Then repeat.
Since this requires a few harvesting and planting cycles you'd ideally want plants that grow as fast as possible, so use plants with maturation and production rate that are as low as possible.
Getting stats from a low production plant onto a low maturation plant before starting the process is best, at which point you can focus on yield, to get more seeds, then potency.
It is also better to use a plant that cannot mutate into a new species to allow for a higher mutation level in the tray for a greater change in stats.
Bees
Bees will passively increase the yield and potency of plants and they polinate them. They will also boost the amount harvested from the plants up to 20, but only if the trays they are in are not self sustaining.
This is technically more consistent than mutating, but it is much slower than a good mutation procedure and requires bees from cargo besides.
Advanced Hydroponics
Plant Chemistry
Plants have a normal capacity of 50u, independent of potency, which goes up to 100u with the densified chemicals trait.
The order of operations when determining which chemicals will end up in the plant, and in what amount, is:
- Add the reagent from the current gene in an amount that is potency multiplied by the amount specified in the gene, bound from above by the amount of space remaining for reagents.
- Perform all reactions between reagents in the plant as they would happen in any other container.
- Look at the next gene.
These two effects mean the plant will only have the reagents it has space for, with any excess being deleted.
For an example a plant with the reagent genes:
- 35% charcoal
- 20% ammonia
Will contain at 100 potency:
- 35u charcoal
- 15u of ammonia
And at 80 potency:
- 28u of charcoal
- 16u ammonia
An another example is a plant with 100 potency and the following reagent genes:
- 20% corn oil
- 25% sulphuric acid
- 20% ammonia
It will contain:
- 6u of glycerol
- 2u of corn oil
- 19u of sulphuric acid
- 20u of ammonia
However, with the same genes in a different order:
- 20% corn oil
- 20% ammonia
- 25% sulphuric acid
The plant would contain:
- 6u glycerol
- 2u corn oil
- 20u ammonia
- 4u sulphuric acid
Note that the total amount of reagents is changed because now the reaction happens after the last reagent was added to the plant, rather than before.
Trait Interactions
For the most part traits are quite straight forward, but some have interactions either with each other or plants with unique features that are worth noting:
- Strong Bioluminescence affects wearable(eg: poppy, ambrosia) and placeble(eg: glowcaps, glowshrooms, shadowshrooms) plants. It produces a green light on glowberries, but on most other plants the light is white.
- If a plant has both the Bluespace Activity and Liquid Contents traits and is squished in hand, or by being thrown at another creature, the order at which it will teleport or squish is the same as the order at which the traits were inserted.
If bluespace activity is first any reagents will apply to the tile teleported to and any gas cloud that would be formed by Gaseous Decomposition would also be placed there. And If liquid contents is first the squish will happen before the teleport.
Additional Features
Beekeeping
So, you want to keep those little flying demons and extract their sweet honey? First you need to request a Beekeeping starting kit from your local cargo bay. The starter kit will contain the items that you will need to create a happy bee colony from scratch. We'll get through all of them later. Before we begin, keep in mind that when a starter kit is ordered from cargo you are expected to have complete responsibility for the bees in your future colony, so don't fuck up!
Preparing Your New Colony
Now that your crate has arrived it's time to get your hands dirty! Take your crate and head to the desired place where your colony will reside and open it there. Of course, as a botanist, the obvious place will be at hydroponics. Lets set up the apiary.
Aaand... Your first colony is ready!
Apiary Management
If you right-click and examine your apiary, it'll show some stats. The resource supply represents the amount of honey contained in the apiary. You need to have plants around your apiary so the bees can produce resources. While the bees fly around the plants the resource supply will rise, simple as that. When you check the apiary, it'll show the amount of resources needed to create a new honeycomb or a new bee in the moment that you checked it. A new bee costs 50 resources, while a new honeycomb costs 100 resources. These honeycombs can be ground up into honey, a sweet substance that has minor healing properties, and can be used to make certain foods and drinks.
Genetic Manipulation
The queen bee can also be injected with chemicals to cause the resulting bees to have special properties. To do so, simply use a syringe with the chemical of your choice on the queen bee before putting it in the apiary. You can change the queen's chemical as many times as you want. When a bee is created from an altered queen, it'll carry the same chemical that the queen was injected with.
When a honeycomb is created by an altered bee, half of its chemical content will be the same as the chemical injected in the bee, with the other half being honey. This creates an easy method of 'farming' chemicals that may be hard to get. The last effect that the chemical will have is the bee sting. When stung, a small amount of chemical will be delivered in the sting. Although not an ideal method, this can be used to inject people with healing chemicals, or possibly harmful chemicals for those traitors looking to cause chaos.
Keep'em Tame
Better protect your apiary, a single greytide can disrupt the bees and throw them in a rampage. That said, desrupting a colony can be done by attacking the apiary or attacking the bees directly. Keep the bees in their assigned space and don't let them roam around the station, they'll 100% cause trouble if that happens. Although, with the overpopulation problem there is no way you will be able to control ALL the bees. Expect the crew to see the insects at least one time flying around outside Hydroponics. Equip the beekeeper suit and hat in case they get angry!
Dealing with Kudzu
Kudzu is a special plant that can appear as a random event or you can grow it by allowing weeds to overtake Soybeans. (That might result in other weed-type plants, too.) It is a type of space vine that grows and mutates on its own.
Usual plant stats affect active kudzu in the specific way:
- Potency: The higher the potency, the more the kudzu will mutate on spread. The chance to mutate on each new piece is [potency / 10].
- Production Speed: It determines how fast the kudzu spreads. By default, it spreads at a rate of 20% of the amount of pieces per tick but no more than 30. Production Speed changes the cap by [30 * production / 50] and the percent of processed pieces per tick by [20 * (production / 50)].
Killing the last piece of kudzu will create a kudzu seed on its place with all the mutations of the piece saved in the seed, so if you reactivate it, the new first piece will have all the same mutations the seed has and will spread it to all the progenitors. Kudzu can gain mutations on spread or by adding special chemicals to it while the seed is growing (see below).
Mutations
Positive
Color | Name | Description |
---|---|---|
Glassy | Makes the kudzu occasionally drop a glass sheet upon destroying it. | |
Glimmering | Makes the kudzu occasionally drop a diamond, gold, or silver sheet upon destroying it. | |
Light | Makes the kudzu emit light. | |
Metallic | Makes the kudzu occasionally drop a metal sheet upon destroying it. | |
Plasticine | Makes the kudzu occasionally drop a plastic sheet upon destroying it. | |
Space Protective | Makes the kudzu grow in space. | |
Transparency | Makes the kudzu transparent. | |
Wooden | Makes the kudzu occasionally drop a wood plank upon destroying it. |
Minor Negative
Color | Name | Description |
---|---|---|
Bluespace | Makes the kudzu grow through walls and objects. | |
Fireproof | Makes the kudzu resistant to every kind of fire (including plasma fire). | |
Vine-Eating | Makes the kudzu eat every non-vine-eating kudzu tiles. | |
Virulently Spreading | Makes the kudzu spread thicker. |
Negative
Color | Name | Description |
---|---|---|
Aggressive Spreading | Makes the kudzu deal a small explosion upon spreading, destroying windows and other weak objects. It cannot get through reinforced walls. | |
Explosive | Makes the kudzu explode upon death. It induces a chain reaction. | |
Flowering | Makes the kudzu occasionally spawn aggressive flower buds. Every tile can snare passersby. | |
Hardened | Makes the kudzu resistant to sharp objects (halves their damage). Every hardened tile has doubled health. | |
Thorny | Makes the kudzu deal brute damage to whoever passes its tiles, or is deals damage to it. | |
Toxic | Makes the kudzu deal toxic damage to whoever passes its tiles, or eats it. |
Mutating Kudzu
Adding special chemicals to the tray when the seeds are growing will affect the specific kudzu mutations:
- Adding 5u of welding fuel will remove random positive mutation with a 20% probability
- Adding 5u of phenol will remove a random minor negative mutation with a 20% probability
- Adding 5u of sterilizine will remove a random negative mutation with a 20% probability
- Adding 15u of blood will change the production value of the seeds by a random number in the range from -5 to +15
- Adding 5u of amatoxin will change the production value of the seeds by a random number in the range from -15 to +5
- Adding 5u of plasma will change the potency value of the seeds by a random number in the range from -15 to +5
- Adding 10u of holy water will change a potency value of the seeds by a random number in the range from -5 to +15
Notes
- Scythes, sharp objects, and fire deals four times more damage to kudzu.
- Crossing kudzu can snare the crosser, but it doesn't deal damage. Unless it has the Thorny or Toxic mutations.
- Only destroying every vine tile stops the kudzu from spreading.
- The Chef's goat can destroy vines rapidly.
- Vines cannot spread diagonally.
- One tile can only capture one person.
- Glyphosate can wither kudzu with a 50% chance. You can find it in Plant-B-Gone bottles or ask the chemist for some.
- Aliens do not slash vines upon attacking them but eat them.
Expanding Your Growing Space
Whether you wish to grow plants in other places, or simply need more space, you can easily do so by construciting soil plots from either sandstone or soil clumps. Soil clumps can be made in the biogenenerator or in the compost bin, while sandstone can be made by using either sand or volcanic ash in hand(same way as with grass). By using three sandstone bricks or soil clumps you can make a soil plot, which is like a tray, except it cannot be moved, you can walk over it and there are no lights. Sandstone can also be used to make other structures.
Additionally, science can build hydroponics trays. They can also upgrade them by replacing the matter bins, and this increases the water and nutrient capacity of the tray.
Wooden Products
Wood and wood-based accessories can be made with the Towercap mushroom. Use the hatchet (or other sharp object) on Towercap logs to chop some planks. These have many uses: you can make chairs, tables, wooden floors and so on.
- A unique thing here is a drying rack. You can use it to dry a plant, and then smoke it. First, build a rack with 10 planks. Then, grab a plant you want to dry and put it in the rack. Click on the rack and toggle drying so that the red arrows light up. Give it a few seconds and it's done. You can dry any plant, and smoking it will give you all chemicals that were in it. You can smoke dried apples if you want, and get nutriment from them.
- You can use planks to also build fermenting barrels. Shove some plants in and they become fermented alcohols with their various reagents over time.
- Using 10 planks you can make a compost bin. It converts plants to biomass at the same rate as an unupgraded biogenenerator and converts 20% of the stored biomass into compost every 10 seconds(minimum 10 converted). If also filled with either ash or potassium, it will instead convert biomass to saltpetre crystals. Growing 2 crystals consumes 6 biomass and 1 ash, and growing 1 crystal requires 8 biomass and 1 potassium. Ash will be consumed first and the amount of biomass consumed will not exceed the amount that would be consumed when making compost. Saltpetre crystals each yield 8u of saltpetre when ground. Soil clumps can be made from the compost at the cost of 25 compost per clump.