Overview
!!! IMPORTANT NOTICE !!!This guide as of now (12/21/2020) is NOT updated for mindustry 6.0 and may include some incorrect data, please acknowledge this before reading onwards!
The Core
This section is currently undergoing an update to be accurate for the latest version of mindustry.
This section is about your main structure and hub for all things Mindustry, the Core. Throughout the game you will send yourself and your core to different areas. Some areas have small “Core shards” while others have medium “Core foundations” and most of the harder levels start you with the “Core Nucleus”. The core is used to store materials for later use or for launching to spend on your Tech Tree. Each piece of the core has a different storage capacity. Shards hold 4k of each material, Foundations hold 9k of each material, and Nuclei hold 14k of each material. If your core gets destroyed by Enemies You fail the level.
Core shard, Core foundation and Core nucleus
Your core is used as a main hub. You can put materials in it and take material out of it. Any materials left inside of the core when you Launch will be transferred to your material storage to be spent on your tech tree, or launched to areas with you to give yourself a head start.
It is critically important to protect your core. Most levels will start you off with some weak defenses around the core, while others start you with strong defenses or simply no defenses. Either way, you do not want your core to be destroyed, if it is destroyed you lose all of the materials in the core as well as any buildings on the map, and thus fail the level. Sometimes if you have enough general defense, core defense isn’t needed, but it’s always good to have as a safety precaution
The Defenses
Defenses are one of the main features of mindustry, you will build walls and turrets to defend against the consant enemy threat. As the waves progress and get harder, your defenses should get bigger and stronger. You start out small with Duo turrets and eventually end up with turrets such as the Meltdown which fires a massive laser beam at enemies
3 Duo Turrets
Walls are useful for keeping enemies out of places or making elaborate mazes for enemies to traverse through. They are essential for any successful defense There are a few tiers of walls but they all serve the same purpose. Some walls will be more durable, or some walls will deflect bullets.
Turrets are essential for progression. When fed with ammo they will shoot at enemies and defend your buildings. Most of the early turrets will shoot materials such as Copper, Lead or Graphite, while others such as Arc’s. and the previously mentioned Meltdown, will consume power to shoot. When combined with walls and a steady supply of ammo these can defend your base for a long time, but dont for get to check up on your defenses and update them if needed, you never know when an enemy might break through!
Most of the time you want to dedicate a specific area for defenses. Usually the best area is somewhere near the enemy spawn, or at a “choke point”, usually a natural narrow passage where enemies pass through. A mixture of various turrets is a good idea so that you can counter most enemy units that you face. You can also block off routes using walls so enemies only have one way to go, however if there happens to be a breach in one of these routes they may avoid your defenses entirely.
Example Defense
The Enemies
Enemies are the robots, or units, that try to destroy your core. They come in many different shapes and sizes. Some are equipped with basic lasers and others explode on impact. The first units you will encounter are the Dagger Mechs, Crawler Mechs and Wraith Fighters. All of these units are unique in their own way. Dagger’s are your general infantry. They’ll shoot anything in sight and make their way to your core. Crawler’s will make you way to your core, but if they run into anything on the way they will run into it and explode themselves along with the building. Lastly, Wraith’s are the basic flying units. They will prioritise assaulting your power generation and can be tricky to deal with without dedicated anti-air turrets such as the Scatter
Dagger
The AI will generally try to find the quickest route to the core, regardless of any threats that they may cross. For example, if you walled off an area they would try to go around it since destroying walls takes more time than simply running around. If the enemies have nowhere to go then they will try to break through the thinnest wall, regardless if there are turrets there or not. Since they prefer to not break through walls, this allows you to make a maze of walls for them to go through while you have turrets shooting them. Keep in mind though, since most enemies will attack anything nearby it’s a wise idea to put some Menders by walls if you attempt this.
Most enemies have their own strengths and weaknesses, but these apply to all enemies.
Water + Electricity = Damage. If you use the Wave turrets with water, then put some Arcs down nearby, the enemies that are wet will take extra damage from the arcs of electricity fired by the Arcs
Artillery. Most enemies don’t have long range weapons, with the exceptions of some Bosses and high end enemies. This makes artillery turrets such as the Hail or Ripple extremely useful when defending, especially from an unfavourable position. These turrets also deal Area Damage, meaning that they are great for crowd control aswell.
Bosses are incredibly strong enemies that deal heaps of damage and have a lot of health. From what i know only medium – hard zones have these enemies early-on, so no need to worry just yet. Bosses will really test your defense. Even defenses consisting of dozens of turrets can struggle against bosses and in later waves you’ll have to fight multiple bosses. Now, while this is unlikely to happen until you have high-end turrets that can deal with them it’s always good to have the advantage of knowing and being prepared.
The Player Character
This section is currently undergoing an update to be accurate for the latest version of mindustry. This section may be deleted if there is not enough corresponding content in the latest version of mindsutry.
The player character is the character which you, the player, play as. In Mindustry’s case you play as Ships and Mechs. Each of these transformation ‘types’ have their own advantages and disadvantages. Airborne ships are exceptionally fast however are very susceptible to anti-air turrets and very fragile too. While ships are weak to anti-air, they excel at evading incoming fire aswell as quickly manuevering around your base. Most ships aside from the Dart also come with a substantial boost to firepower, however are very close-ranged. On the other side of the spectrum, the ground-based mechs don’t have to worry about anti-air turrets but instead are targeted by ground-based turrets. Additionally mechs usually have increased health, along with long-range weapons. This gives them an edge during an assault and are very useful for picking off specific enemy buildings or turrets. All in all each transformation is completely unique and hold their own advantages and disadvantages so it’s worth to try them all out!
The Factories
Factories are what produce intermediate materials, such as Pyratite ( A flammable compound used in various turrets), Graphite and Silicon. Some of these materials you can send to the Core, Such as graphite and silicon, Others are used as materials for Advanced Materials.
Making working factories can be a bit complicated, having to bring different materials to it, and then export the product elsewhere, each factory needs different materials and designing them is generally half of the fun, here is a design i came up with that works reliably for factories that require 2 inputs, such as Silicon or Metaglass.
The Power
Power is an important part of mindustry, most factories require power to produce things, and some turrets such as Arcs and Lancers require power to fire. There are multiple ways to generate power, from simple Solar Panels to complex Thorium Reactors. Generally the more complex or expensive, the more power produced.
Batteries are useful for storing runoff power from solar panels, or any other reactors, aswell as making a nice explosion when fully charged then destroyed. Generally batteries are useful early game when you have very few ways to produce power, but they’re not always reliable
Power nodes are your way of transferring power from one point to another, if you click on them you can change their connections, either removing connections or adding connections. Power nodes use lasers to transfer power from one to another, so you can safely surround them in walls to protect them.
The Transportation
Conveyors and Conduits are your main buildings for transportation, good for getting items from one point to another, while they may seem simple at first glance, you can do some truly complicated things with these.
Conduits are for transporting Liquids, such as Water or Oil. Water can be used to speed up buildings such as Drills and Turrets, making them more effecient, while oil can be produced into either Plastanium or Coal
Conveyors are generally the thing you will build the most, as they get your items from place to place automatically. There are also certain conveyors that Split 1 conveyor into 3 aka the Router
or conveyor bridges which bridge gaps over walls and terrain
Other Small Details and Tips
- Turrets can use different types of ammo
- Routers can be connect to eachother making a chain, useful for supplying lots of turrets, but usually you should avoid doing this, unless you have multiple inputs, the ends of the chain will be very empty until everything else is filled up
- Bridges output to 3 directions
- Pyratite, Coal, and Blast Compound all set on fire when something explodes nearby
- Water can put out fires
- If left on the ground from a leaking pipe, slag will start fires
- If you press Shift when in a ground-based mech, you can fly
- Scrap can be processed to make Lead, Titanium, Copper and Graphite
- Wave turrets fuelled with water will put out fires
- You can hover over power nodes to see how much power is being made / consumed, aswell as battery charge
- If you carry pyratite on you and get destroyed, you will go out in a fiery explosion, most likely killing your attacker
End
Thank you for reading my guide on mindustry, if i missed anything please let me know, i want to make this guide as useful as possible for beginners and feedback really helps with that.
Cheerio and have a good day.
[30/12/19 Edit] Updated the images in the guide to actually show instead of just giving a link