Movement
WASD or arrow keys fly the drone. Momentum carries you; plan approaches.
Mining
Hold LEFT CLICK to fire the mining laser at rocks. Each rock takes time to drill. When the drill bar fills, its mineral type and ore yield are revealed. Empty rocks still require a drill cycle, then explode. Buy the Improved Scanner perk to see contents without drilling.
Combat
RIGHT CLICK fires your auto-cannon. Bullets travel forward from your nose, but within medium range and a Β±60Β° forward cone they snap to the nearest rival. Hostile ships show a red HOSTILE tag above them. Two solid hits kill a fighter.
Heat
Sustained mining overheats the laser. At 100% heat the laser and your thrust lock out until it cools below 40%. Don't hold the trigger on rock you've already depleted.
Factions
Your drone flies under your FleshMarket faction's colors. Same-faction drones patrol but won't attack you. Rivals will, and show HOSTILE tags. If you have no faction set, every patrol treats you as hostile, factionless is lone-wolf mode. Syndicate drones are fast and swarm; Void drones are slow but their bullets hit harder; Coalition is balanced.
Scrap
Killing enemies drops salvage. Tougher fights drop more: Void enemies drop more than Coalition, chasing enemies drop more than patrollers, and higher run difficulty scales scrap value up. Risky combat pays off.
Depth
NEAR iron and cobalt, thin hostiles. MID gold appears. DEEP painite, void opal, thick hostiles. VOID musgravite, Ζ250/unit, swarms.
Docking
Return to the mothership and press Q to bank your current cargo. You can dock, leave, and mine again as many times as you want. Drones only get refunded at end of run if they're still alive. Fuel is not refilled on dock. One tank per drone.
Dying
One hostile round ends the drone. The run is over. Undeployed escorts and refineries are refunded at end of run.
Refineries
Optional loadout item. Press R in the field to deploy a portable fuel refinery. It generates fuel while you park near it. Enemies can destroy it.
Escorts
Optional loadout item. Small combat drones orbit your drone and shoot hostiles automatically. They absorb hits for you. They die with your drone.
Ships
The SHIPS button opens the shipyard. Twelve alternate hulls across three faction styles: Coalition (mining focus, faster drills, higher heat cap), Syndicate (combat focus, higher fire rate, free escorts), Void (drone focus, built-in cargo drones that haul ore to the mothership while you mine). Ships are one-time purchases, available regardless of your own faction. Stats multiply your loadout tiers and perks. Each ship class also grants additional hull HP: Scout 2, Prospector 3, Hauler 4, Dreadnought 5. You survive that many hits before dying. Press T in the field to toggle auto-miner on ships that have it, off by default to protect your heat sink in easy zones.