Salvaging is process of locating and processing mechanical debris and abandoned or destroyed vehicles. The goal is to turn a profit through the sale of detached components, Recycled Material Composite (RMC) stripped from the surface of vehicle hulls and debris, and the remainder disintegrated and repackaged as Construction Materials.
As of Patch 3.22, Salvage mechanics are currently implemented in the form of salvaging components/cargo and the two steps of processing vehicle hulls and debris — Hull Scraping and Structural Salvage — to collect Recycled Material Composite (RMC) and Construction Materials to sell.[1] To process vehicle hulls and debris, players can use their multitool (with the Cambio-Lite SRT Attachment), the Cambio SRT or either of the two Salvage-oriented ships (the Vulture and the Aegis Reclaimer), although the first two are limited to Hull Scraping and collecting RMC for minor repairs.
Where to find salvage
Abandoned vehicles
In high traffic areas or points of interest such as salvage yards, underground facilities or so on, destroyed or abandoned vehicles can occasionally be found laying around. While destroyed vehicles can immediately be salvaged, intact vehicles should be scanned first to identify vehicle ownership. If the owner of the vehicle is listed as "Gamerules", then the original owner has already claimed a new version of that vehicle, and can be safely salvaged.
Abandoned intact vehicles may also still have their shields and/or power on, preventing you from carrying out Hull Scraping or Structural Salvage. However, dealing Distortion damage (ie. with Suckerpunch Cannons) is an effective way to safely power down the ship for salvaging, without risk of getting a crimestat if you are within monitored space.
Note that while you can find an abundance of abandoned or destroyed vehicles around areas such as stations, attempting to salvage any non-destroyed ship inside the Armistice Zone will result in the player being charged with "Armistice Violation" and issued the corresponding fine and increase in CrimeStat regardless of whether or not the ship is already abandoned. Players can, however, tow the vehicle outside of the Armistice Zone to salvage it without reprecussions.
Missions
Salvage missions will spawn abandoned ships for you to salvage, and players can find legal or illegal missions in the Contract Manager of their mobiGlas under the General and Personal tabs, respectively.
| Mission Type | Legality | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Salvage Rights | Legal | Pay a small fee in exchange for giving you the location of a small abandoned ship, after which you may leave or abandon the mission whenever you see fit, without any penalty. |
| Salvage Job | Illegal | Works just like the "Salvage Rights" mission, with the exception of having to pay a higher cost in exchange for the location of a medium to large abandoned ship. Ships with cargo grids may spawn with cargo. There is a timer that begins counting down starting from when the mission is accepted, after which security forces will arrive at the wreck site and attempt to detain anyone within the trespass zone (and even nearby trespass zones)! |
| Clean up | Illegal | There is no fee that needs to be paid to start this mission, and if the ship is considered "sufficiently salvaged" (enough of its hull has been stripped or the ship has been fractured) or towed far enough from its original location, an additional payment is awarded to you. There is also a timer which will spawn in security forces after it ends. |
| In the Wake of Disaster | See description | Pay a substantial fee in exchange for the location of a cluster of large abandoned ships, with no timer. Abandoned ships in this mission have a higher chance of spawning with more amounts of high-value cargo.
While the mission is technically illegal, as the salvage area sits outside of monitored space it is not marked as a trespass zone and security forces will not show up. In addition, multiple players in the same session can also take this mission, and as crimes committed outside of monitored space are not recorded, expect fights for control of the area. |
Types of salvage operations
Component and Cargo Salvage
Using either the TruHold Tractor Beam Attachment on a multitool, a MaxLift Tractor Beam or any ship-based Tractor Beam, players can detach the following off of vehicle hulls:
- Ship weapons and missiles but not missile racks
- Gimbal weapon mounts
- Shield generators
- Power plants
- Coolers
- Quantum drives
With non-destroyed vehicles, the player will need to ensure that the vehicle's ports are unlocked from the driver/pilot's seat before any components can be detached.
Sometimes, players may find cargo containers within vehicle hulls or scattered nearby — ranging from processed food to highly valuable (and illegal) drugs — that can be sold elsewhere, though it should be noted that the Vulture suffers from a small cargo hold and the Reclaimer's cargo hold lacks ease of access especially for cargo containers larger than 24 SCU.
Hull Scraping
By "scraping" off the outer surface of vehicle hulls and debris using the salvage beams of Salvage-dedicated ships such as the Drake Vulture or the Aegis Reclaimer, players can collect Recycled Material Composite (RMC) to package and sell.
While a multitool (with the Cambio-Lite SRT Attachment) and Cambio SRT can perform Hull Scraping and collect RMC in canisters, selling filled canisters does not generate profit as they are sold for no more than an empty one. Instead, the collected RMC is meant to be used to make light repairs to the hulls of non-destroyed vehicles.
To perform Hull Scraping on a non-destroyed vehicle, that vehicle's shields must be turned off first.
Structural Salvage
Also known as "munching", Salvage-dedicated ships are able to further extract profit from vehicle hulls and debris by breaking it apart for packaging and reselling as Construction Materials. To do so, the player must first use the Salvage-dedicated ship's Fracture mode to break apart the vehicle's hull into chunks, then using Disintegration mode to process and collect said chunks as Construction Materials.
Non-destroyed vehicles can only be fractured if their power is shut off. In addition, fracturing a vehicle will kill all occupants inside as well as destroy any undetached components (though any unscraped RMC on the hull will remain present and scrapable on the chunks). Therefore, it is recommended that players first detach any components of value, perform Hull Scraping and ensure the vehicle is evacuated before fracturing.
Note that the legality of fracturing a vehicle follows the same rules as destroying ships using weapons. To avoid the accompanying risk of recieving a fine and CrimeStat increase, ensure that the vehicle either:
- Has its owner listed as "Gamerules",
- Belongs to someone with a CrimeStat rating of 3 or higher (ie. bounty targets),
- Has no owner (ships spawned by salvage missions),
- Sits in an area with no commlink (ie. outside of monitored space or with the local Comm Array disabled), or
- Is already destroyed.
The Vulture can only fracture ships up to as large as the Mercury Star Runner, while the Reclaimer can fracture ships of any size.
Salvaging Equipment
Salvage-Focused Ships
"Answer to no one, cut out the middleman, and throw caution to the wind. Rip wrecks like a pro and carve out your own place in the great big empty behind the stick of this rough, rugged, single-operator salvage machine from Drake Interplanetary." [2]
Designed for a crew of one, the Vulture is the go-to vehicle for those who salvage alone or are seeking to try their hand at turning wrecks into money. With both ship and salvaging controls tied directly to the pilot seat, players will only need to get out of their seat to package any collected material sitting in the Vulture's modest 13 SCU buffer.
However, due to the Vulture's smaller size, the equally modest 12 SCU cargo grid will be full after fracturing a small ship or two, giving you even less room to collect any abandoned cargo you come across. As such, you will need to offload cargo either at a point of sale or another ship for storage — unless you are willing to share your living quarters with some freshly packaged Construction Materials.
"The Aegis Reclaimer is an industrial salvage ship. Equipped with a reinforced cargo bay, a long-range jump drive and launch pods for unmanned drones, the Reclaimer is an ideal ship for taking advantage of deep space wrecks. Tractor beams, floodlights, scanner options and docking ports round out the tools on this capable, utilitarian spacecraft. The listed Cargo Capacity is only for the dedicated Cargo Room and does not account for the salvaged material capacity which will be detailed later." [3]
The next step for those seeking to scale up their salvaging operations with some friends or hired hands, the Reclaimer is a sub-capital heavy salvaging ship with a colossal combined cargo grid capacity of 420 SCU, and like the Vulture, "extra storage space" can be found throughout the ship: with extensive corridors, multiple rooms and substantial overhead space in the cargo hold. The defining feature of the Reclaimer — the large "claw" under and in front of the bridge — can fracture any vehicle in the game, unlike the Vulture. In addition, the Reclaimer comes with two large filler stations that can package RMC and Construction Materials into 2, 8 and 16 SCU cargo containers to move and store more at a time.
While the Reclaimer can be operated with a crew of one, with the controls of the ship, "claw" and scraper modules all belonging to different seats, running about the ship will be a given, and with the majority of it's defensive firepower attached to turrets not slaved to the pilot, a Reclaimer with few crew members will be a ripe target for even undersized opportunists. Access to the cargo hold is also restricted to two cargo elevators, making it somewhat more difficult for crews to store any detached components and very for containers larger than 24 SCU.
Scraper Modules
Salvaging-focused ships are equipped with at least two Scraper Modules, allowing the use of hull-stripping lasers to extract RMC from the surface of vehicle hulls and debris.
| Name | In-game Description | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Abrade Scraper Module | It's easy to see why the Abrade from Greycat Industrial is one of the most used scraper module in the 'verse. Its design delivers both a sizable area of effect and respectable extraction rate, creating a reliable beam that can scrape hulls quickly and efficiently. | Average area of effect and RMC yield. |
| Cinch Scraper Module | The Cinch is a precision scraper module that produces a small, focused beam perfect for extracting resources from every nook and cranny on a hull. While the beam's relatively small size requires more time to remove Recycled Material Composite (RMC), its excellent extraction rate will make the added effort worth it. | Higher RMC yield, smaller area of effect; Takes longer to hull scrape but more total RMC. |
| Trawler Scraper Module | Scrape more of a hull in one pass with the Trawler scraper module. While the area of effect is larger than other modules, it is less efficient due to intense heat generating more burn off. Making the Trawler the ideal module to use when a job necessitates speed over efficiency. | Lower RMC yield, larger area of effect. Fast hull scraping but lower total RMC. |
Handheld Equipment
Having a multitool — with the appropriate attachments — will allow you to perform Component and Cargo Salvage, minor hull repairs (as well as some Hull Scraping to collect the RMC needed to perform repairs).
| Name | In-game Description |
|---|---|
| TruHold Tractor Beam Attachment | Whether your feet are on the floor or floating in zero-G, the TruHold attachment for the Pyro RYT Multi-Tool makes lifting and positioning items easier than ever. With its impressive and efficient pull/draw ratio and easy-to-read range finder, the TruHold can be used solo or paired with other beams to tackle heavier targets. Plus, the TruHold has the added benefit of functioning as a personal zero-G traversal device when coupled to an object with a high enough mass. |
| Cambio-Lite SRT Attachment | The Cambio-Lite SRT Attachment enhances the Pyro RYT Multi-Tool by enabling salvaging and repair capabilities such as hull stripping. |
| Cambio-Lite SRT Attachment (can) | Canister used in conjunction with the Pyro RSY Multi-Tool and Cambio-Lite SRT attachment to store recycled material compostie (RMC) reclaimed from scrap. Contents can be sold or used to make repairs. |
The Cambio SRT is designed exclusively for the task of Hull Scraping and Repairs, and utilises a higher capacity canister to store more RMC at once. While not as fast at Hull Scraping as a Salvage-oriented ship, it is a substantial improvement over the Cambio-Lite SRT Attachment in terms of speed and efficiency, and still retains its ability to carry out minor hull repairs. However, being the size of a rifle instead of a utility item, it cannot be stored in backpacks or smaller and takes up a large weapon slot on the character.
The MaxLift Tractor Beam is well suited for maneuvering larger, heavier objects than what a multitool's TruHold Tractor Beam Attachment is capable of — especially in gravity — but like the Cambio SRT, it loses its portability as a rifle-sized device and has similar storage limitations.
Selling Salvaged Goods
Vehicle Components
Detached vehicle components in the cargo bay of a player's ship can be sold anywhere that component can be purchased from. For example, as the Atlas can be purchased from High Course Station's Platinum Bay, any Atlas you come across can also be sold via the terminal there. Or if you come across some M7A Cannons, since those are purchasable from the Crusader Industries Showroom on Orison, you can also sell those there.
Recycled Material Composite (RMC) and Construction Materials
Both RMC and Construction Materials can be sold off in the TDD of any city (or the Central Business District in Lorville).
Grim HEX and salvage yards are also points of sale for both commodities, however, it is less advisable to sell here as these locations offer lower prices in addition to the inherent lack of security in these areas. That being said, if you are also carrying illicit goods or have a CrimeStat rating of 3 or higher, the absence of security forces may be exactly what you are looking for.
References
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