Been Playing Since Early Access; Still Suck

Steam says I've put in at least a hundred hours into Starbound, contrasting Starbound regular with Unstable, but I know that's undecutting it a fair amount - I've been playing for years.

And I still suck.

The easy way out is to bitch that the combat is bad but I am pretty sure I am just bad at combat. I can't figure-out out to get-through the Erchius mine, for example - I always en up cheating through it because i is long, repetitive, and I played it endlessly during its beta testing, but whenever I try to play uncheated I die within the first few encounters. I've tried hacking through with a longsword, I've tried sword and shield, trying to use the shield to block the vomit - the flesh creatures always just push against me and then I die, and then i get pissy and quit.

I don't know what I do wrong, but I cannot win at Starbound.

 

Well, to this day I feel the Moontants are both too powerful and too numerous for such an early mission where you don't have access to higher-tier stuff. Many of the later missions are less difficult even without accounting for equipment.

But lemme throw these advices at you...

• Scour every planet in your system for a gun or three. You can travel in-system without beating the mine, so go for that. Dig underground if needed.
• JUMP TECH. You want that so much. It'll help you dodge, get back up to safe zones. Dash Tech for quick retreats too.
• With that in mind, go slow. Tackle mutants at no more than two at a go if at all possible. They're lousy at moving upward, so the jump tech can get you back up to safe zones, and take advantage of any beds you can find.
• Use a dang gun at first sight. Pick off enemies from afar, or at least weaken them so once they get close one good thwack with some two-hander will splat them.
• Salves salves salves. Make lots.
• Cooking! I admit I can't give you much specific info here (I'm bad about remembering to cook beyond Collection checkbox-filling), but take a look at what you can cook at the basic Cooking Table and see what gives you an HP Max boost and whatnot.

Hope these help.

 

This is good advice - and after I posted I really buckled down and took it slow and steady through the moonbase, no cheats, and I beat it for the first time using sword and shield! (I find the boss far, far easier to defeat than the hordes of Moonmen.)

That being said it didn't make it a very fun mission - having to lure one Moonman after another away from the group, and in such numbers it quickly got repetitive. I think the missions admittedly-great horror aesthetic ended-up compromising the mission itself - Starbound just isn't really equipped for the power-imbalance horror games rely on.

 

That mission takes like 5 minutes tops. You can quite easily bumrush through it, stopping at some points to rest and recover. Plus, the mission is actually easier now than it was when they first released it.

Starbound does not take very kindly to melee playstyles, though melee typically is stronger in raw power. The mission has plenty of points where shooting is easily done with little risk. If they get close, just make a dash to the other side and pepper them some more with shots.

 

Since I did not find this to easy despite multiple attempts, I find your insinuation of this to be a universal truth daft.

 

I had trouble at first too, I figured out you just had to pick them off from a distance and when they get close, back up a little to avoid goo. Bombs are also good to have because you can insta kill clusters. Shock element weapons are also extremely useful considering this enemy attacks in hordes. Ice element slows enemies down but not sure if it worked on these guys because they still closed the distance pretty fast.

 

I generally find the Erchius mine mission pretty hard too. I generally try to get full iron armor, all of the techs, like 30 healing items, and then just snipe with a weapon (preferably a pair of grenade launchers with bouncing projectiles, since they are perfect for trick shots and taking out large groups of enemies. Also, with some weapons, you can stand behind some doors, attack once, and then close the door before the moontants manage to get in or attack you. As for the boss, just activate every thing as quickly as possible, jumping through beams and using a healing item if necessary. To ensure you have enough health and regen, set up a farm so you can get the Full Belly regen buff during the entire mission.

After that, just try to get as high a tier of armor as possible before fighting a boss, make sure to recruit crew (and preferably get a mod or two that makes crew not suck, either one that fixes their AI or one or more that buffs them to compensate for their AI), and get crazy amounts of elemental fluffalos (protip, going away from the planet where you placed the egg causes twin fluffalos) so you can get the full set of perfect armor as soon as the store for perfectly generic items unlocks. I also generally invest in the triplejump and air dash, since that gives me two ways to prevent fall damage, one of which doesn't run out. If you have difficultly using the dash, get a mod that rebinds it. Spike ball is always a must. I also generally make sure to use the full hotbar (you can switch to a second section with the x key, in case you didn't now) to carry around the following weapons: a spear with the rocket spear special (for navigating asteroid fields and because holding down the mouse button keeps it extended, causing most enemies to continously run into it yet not get close enough to hit you), a pair of grenade launchers (for groups of enemies and trickshots), a pair of pistols (for long range where grenade launchers cannot reach), a pair of shortswords/daggers (whichever one has the highest DPS) and a staff with the healing special (for emergencies, like suffering from lava damage). I also always try to get the healing augment for my EPP. I sometimes also carry a rocket launcher with the guided rocket special, which is useful in dungeons, since you can just fire around four corners, killing enemies without them even noticing you.

In a pinch, one-shot throwing weapons, like spears and darts, can be found very commonly in chests, and can be gotten using a tenant if you don't find enough for your liking. They're remarkably powerful.

Also, yeah, the Erchius Horror takes less time than some of the more unfortunately placed moontants.

 

I was pretty lucky the first time I did this mission back in 0.9 (The release candidate for 1.0); having found a lovely whirling blade spear on the first planet.

I mainly though used hit and run tactics, since that is the best for that specific dungeon. Basically backing off when I saw them about ready to spit in my face. Granted back then it was tougher. I do agree though, that the boss is the easiest part of the dungeon. It was neither easy or hard to get to it. At least for myself with plenty of healy items and my sword shield combo I had along with the spear. Spears have a good distance to keep the frey back a bit when used a certain way. I play defensively most of the time.

All that and wanted to explore the place as much I can so I get all the special boxes & areas short from the ball access one. I usually gun for double jump anyhow to ensure even more my own survival.

I have been able to do it with and without the iron armor, although I tend to get that anyway to make sure I survive longer. I have gone through it a total of 3 times. Once was after 1.0 & the other time was I think 1.1 or 1.2; something like that. That is the reason I know it was a tad easier; although those hammer people are almost seemingly the most annoying ones. Managed though. After all with those I can just back track to have the humans hauled up in that one room help me with them.

Can't really say skill is much a part of it, as I die constantly; I just use the environment to my advantage when possible. Figure out the safe or semi-safe zones so I can back track and heal when needed. But yes, taking it slow or at least a moderate pace is best. Can't really go gun-ho through the level unless you have that nack or skill or practice to be able to do that. I know I can barely do that if I wanted for how much I played that level; even before the boss was put in. So I knew the layout pretty well, as not much has changed. Well they were small changes here and there, but that didn't really affect my knowledge of the layout much.

For a knew person I can see it being daunting at first. Especially if they are the ones that like rushing in or through things quickly. I personally am use to taking a turtles pace, so I can rethink what I need to do in order to get through. Thank goodness this is the only one required in order to explore planets; outpost things unlocking aside. I might have another go sooner or later, but right now more focused on empire building when I play the game.

 

I'd forgotten about bringing crew along. Two extra folks to shoot enemies from afar and soak up some damage is super-helpful.

Sure they're unlikely to make it all the way through but still.

 

Can you even bring crew, though? I thought the Frögg shop doesn't re-open until after you complete the Erchius mission.

(Hey, remember the days when they said there wold be alternate routes to completing the game like trading and farming and not just combat? ha ha, oh, those were the days.

Don't get me wrong Starbound is perhaps my most-played game in years and I love it, but some point near the end of its development cycle it feels like the priority became the main storyline that never interested me in the first place - i.e. I wasn't playing the game for 'save the galaxy' reasons that are now mandatory if you want to get late-game content.)

 

Ha ha, true. Though I guess if I were the player, a Protectorate who just escaped a wartorn world, my first instinct wouldn't be a professional farmer In all seriousness, the devs did say that and farming hasn't become more than an extra chore with needing to water your crops all the time.

Anyways if it's too hard, my last resort strategy is go multiplayer and smuggle better (but not overly high tier) equipment.

 

Just about any non-hostile, player-race NPC can ask favors of the sort Tenants do, and may ask to join your crew. I haven't set up a single Colony Deed yet but I was able to max out my ship and crew. I have a Janitor who I recruited from one of the science stations on a Mutated Planet, still wears the headgear (which is great).

If you have a village in your starter system (likely), you have options.

 

In the newest version, you probably won't have the option to bring a crew member, because the shop selling deeds isn't open until after the mission. Nor can you search beyond your starter planet at that stage for more resources / weapons. So basically you're stuck with level 1 weapons (or low-level legendaries like the boomerang if you're lucky). I only got through it because I made sure I had douple-jump and sprint techs.

 

I got lucky on my most recent playthrough and got a sword with a dash RMB that left a fire trail on the ground. I was able to beat the facility with only that, iron chest and legs, and a ton of bandages and salves. I agree that it seems far too difficult for the first mission - the second mission, for example, is far, far easier and it's for one of the keys, so I don't really know why there's such a difficulty gap.
I think the moontants need to have their 'spray' nerfed majorly, as it seems to be the biggest cause of concern for new players going in.

 

It isn't hard if you know how to do this mission. Bring few salves and craft tons of hunting spears(maybe not tons, but ~50-100 will do), they have crazy damage for early game, are ranged, cheap to craft and are available early game . Bringing any melee weapon for this mission is a mistake.

 

if you have the salve/bandages to spare or food avaliable you can kill them with just the protectorate sword. no armor needed. key thing is to learn the maximum distance of their ranged attack in order to dodge. then strike them with both normal and special attack, they died fast to that. but yeah you need to get as few contact damage as possible. if you have spare hunting spears use them, you can also find weapons inside the dungeon so try to capitalize on that.

 

...This mission is supposed to be hard? I always ran through it fairly quickly, even collecting all the hidden costume pieces. Some healing items, a full set of basic armor, and literally any weapon (a gun, if you have trouble dodging the moontants' ranged attacks, but I've never had trouble there) get the job done. Unlocking any tech slots you have the resources for beforehand is also helpful, but far from required (unless you want the translation wheel; you obviously need sphere tech to reach that).

Honestly, I've probably died more on Nuru's mission than I ever had in this mission, even counting the times I ran through when it was the only mission.

 

I dont even go into that mission with any armor, i just bring along what weps i find in the abandoned mine (if any) and some medical supplies...