WOLF · Wandering Order of the Last Frontier
From the Creche to a self-sufficient industrial base, step by step. Tick goals as you go — progress is saved in your browser. Costs verified against game data (cycle 7). Patches change numbers; when in doubt, ask in tribe chat.
Mined ore (from your logs) minus what you've built (checked goals) = what you can afford.
Start the Frontier Stack (member kit) and this fills in from your mining logs automatically.
| Ore | Mined (this cycle) | Spent (checked goals) | Available |
|---|---|---|---|
| Platinum-Palladium Matrix | — | 0 | — |
| Feldspar Crystals | — | 0 | — |
| Hydrated Sulfide Matrix | — | 0 | — |
With your available ore you could build
| Item | Ore cost (PPM / FC / HSM) | Affordable now |
|---|
Costs are ore-equivalents for the pure mining route (single-run blue goo recipe). Salvage makes the foam-tier items much cheaper, and tiny costs (sensors, lenses, fuel) are ignored — treat this as a planning compass, not accounting.
The game guides you from the Creche until the objective list runs out. Then we take over.
You spawn in a Creche. Follow the tutorial objectives to the end (refuel, build a Network Node, resolve a signature, use the Leap Drive, build your Sanctuary, build and install a Cutting Laser…). After the last objective the game stops telling you what to do — that's where this guide begins.
Heads-up: what the tutorial calls your Sanctuary is a Refuge — the structure you can dock at. Same thing, two names. After the tutorial you should have: a flying ship with a Cutting Laser, your Refuge placed, a Leap Drive, and your first refine done.
Goals
Sensors are almost free. There is no excuse to fly blind.
Space is full of signatures. From far away they show as unresolved — you know something is there, not what. Get closer and they resolve, or identify them from range with a Directional Scanner.
| Signature | What it is | Who cares |
|---|---|---|
| Gravity | Asteroids | Miners — this is your income |
| EM | Ships (NPC and players) | Combat / staying alive |
| EM (probably) | Loot caches | Everyone — to be confirmed |
| Module | Cost | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Gravity Sensor | 2× Silicon Dust | Spot asteroids from further away |
| Ion Sensor | 2× Silicon Dust | Spot ships / EM signatures |
| Directional Scanner | 3× Printed Circuits + 3× Silicon Dust + 1× Nickel-Iron Veins | Resolve signatures at range |
Goals
Your real mining speed is set by how often you run back to base.
Your ship has no built-in cargo hold — space comes only from container modules. Every trip between the belt and your base is time not spent mining, so cargo capacity is the single best early investment:
| Module | Capacity | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Cargo Container | 36 m³ | 4× Silica Grains + 5× Nickel-Iron Veins + 1× Brace Weld (= 2× NIV + 1× Water Ice) — cheap, spam these |
| Emergency Container | 25 m³ | 4× Cargo Debris + 2× Salvaged Materials — needs salvage, add later |
Goals
~2 550 ore total. The whole entry price of independence.
A base with a Refinery turns ore into goo — tribe slang for the three liquid components everything is made from: blue goo = Reinforced Alloys, orange goo = Thermal Composites, black goo = Carbon Weave (plus Printed Circuits, the fourth basic component). Without a Refinery you can't process ore; without a Mini Printer you can't make modules. Build these four, in this order:
| # | Building | Construction cost | Why |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Network Node | 10× Printed Circuits + 10× Carbon Weave + 10× Thermal Composites | Prerequisite — nothing works without network coverage |
| 2 | Refinery | 15× Reinforced Alloys + 15× Thermal Composites | Turns ore into goo — the engine of everything |
| 3 | Mini Printer | 15× Printed Circuits + 15× Reinforced Alloys | Makes modules and components |
| 4 | Relay | 6× Printed Circuits + 6× Carbon Weave + 6× Thermal Composites | Extends network range |
Two dirt-cheap quality-of-life buildings — they cost raw ore, no processing:
| Building | Cost | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Field Storage | 50× Feldspar Crystals (raw) | Dump cargo at the belt without hauling home |
| Refuge | 50× Platinum-Palladium Matrix (raw) | Dock & safe log-off — yes, another one; the tutorial Refuge stays where it was |
| Field Cairn | 2× Printed Circuits | Cheap marker |
The mining shopping list — the Core Four refined down to ore:
| Ore | Amount | Becomes |
|---|---|---|
| Platinum-Palladium Matrix | ~600 | Palladium + Iron-Rich Nodules + Silica Grains (→ blue goo) |
| Feldspar Crystals | ~670 (+50 raw) | Silica Grains + Hydrocarbon Residue (→ circuits, orange goo) |
| Hydrated Sulfide Matrix | ~1 270 | Hydrocarbon Residue (→ black & orange goo) |
Run the Frontier Stack from the member kit and this tracks itself from your mining logs — no manual counting.
Want to plan bigger targets? The board's Goal Planner breaks any blueprint down to raw materials recursively.
Goals
Jobs run in parallel — the limit is facilities, not time.
One Refinery becomes a bottleneck fast. Industry jobs run in parallel, so the real limit is how many facilities you have (and how much clicking you tolerate). Priorities, in order:
Goals
Everything bigger is built from foam. Salvage is the shortcut.
Everything past the starter tier — Printer, Storage, Heavy Printer/Refinery, Nest, gates — is built from Building Foam (10 BF = 65 blue + 65 black + 65 orange goo). Foam is expensive via mining:
| Building | Cost | Ore-equivalent (mining route) |
|---|---|---|
| Printer / Storage | 20 BF each | ~12 700 ore |
| Nest (ship hangar) | 20 BF | ~12 700 ore |
| Heavy Printer / Heavy Refinery | 100 BF | ~63 500 ore |
| Heavy Storage | 120 BF | ~76 000 ore |
Salvage shortcuts all of this. The bulk split (20× Salvaged Materials → 1 black + 2 orange + 6 blue goo) means 20 BF ≈ 2 600 Salvaged Materials, and salvage fields yield fast. Priority: Cargo Debris > Crystalline Refuse > Debris (Crystalline Refuse is the only source of Kerogen Tar, needed for gates). Salvage fields exist only in some systems — ask the tribe where.
Goals
The endgame is infrastructure nobody builds alone.
You're self-sufficient now. What comes next is shared: Mini Gate (300× Kerogen Tar + 65 BF + 12× Still Kernels, 65 ly range) up to a Heavy Gate (1 050 KT + 225 BF + 42 SK, 365 ly — roughly 342 000 ore-equivalent). These are tribe goals with shared contribution tracking on the board.
Goals
Don't learn these the hard way.