How do wires work?

[Dorkkeli]

Hey, I'm quite new to the game, only been playing a few months and this is my first forum post!

Just a simple question, how do cables work? How do I make proper working power circuits and fix existing ones? And hook up floodlights etc..

Know this might be a stupid question, for the veteran MT's and CE's, but the wiki didn't tell me much..

Thanks in advance!

[NethIafins]

There are two types of wires. Wires in objects (color coded and accessible when you remove cover from items like door, apc) and cable coils (the ones you see on the floor)

Game objects (doors, lights, items that consume electricity) work by drawing power from APC using magic (which is basically smaller cables but to reduce clutter they are omitted) and Area Power Controller has to be directly connected to power network by cable coils. Floodlights work using same magic as lights drawing power from APC, but their "controller" is located usually near current map's powerplant.

In item wires are mostly like a minigame, you cut/probe stuff and have results with varied usefulness. Sometimes you get shocked because you guessed wrong wire. Sometimes you royally screw up with the item and some additional actions have to be done on it

Hope this was helpful

[Dorkkeli]

Thanks man, this was helpful!

[Bronimin]

Wires under floors can be damaged by explosions, crowbar up the tiles or use a t-ray scanner to see what is under the floors.

Laying wire is easy, just click on the floor with a cable in hand to lay half a tile's worth.

If you need any more help, you can join the discord-- there is a whole channel dedicated to small questions you might need asking and 50+ people online at a time to help out

[Oaks]

For the planetside floodlights, your only option is the main power facility on each of the maps, so the biggest advice I can give you is learn how to fix and rebuild APC's. As a combat engineer, always bring 5+ powercells and at least 1 or 2 power control modules from your prep vendor. Cable coil isn't all that useful on the planet, but if you want to fix Tcomms or the main power source for the colony, you need modules and knowing how to deal with APC's thoroughly.

Also, a great way to learn the basics of engineering is to play a few rounds as MT. There is no pressure to really do anything once power on the ship is set, and you can pretty much just practice whatever you want to learn more about.