Solar Expats

Goal: First to 100 Victory Points wins! Build colonies and stations to earn VP. Distant planets are worth more.

Guides: New to the game? The New Player Guide walks through colonies, stations, and the early game, and the Faction Guide covers every faction's strengths and strategies. Both open in a new tab, so your game keeps running.

Starting Situation:

Each faction starts at Earth with a thematic fleet — e.g. UDF fields a Battlestar strike group (the only faction that can board and bombard from turn one), ORE a scout expedition, FTU a freighter caravan, MCA a colony ship with settlers already aboard. Every fleet includes a Destroyer escort and at least one loaded freighter. The UN declares a 24-turn (2-year) starting truce. Attacks are possible during a truce — but breaching one brings UN peacekeeper waves down on the aggressor. Use the truce to explore and expand!

UN Law (Truces & Peacekeepers):

• Truces don't block attacks - they punish them. Breach the starting truce, an event-declared truce, or a local truce you agreed to, and UN battlestar waves hunt your ships until you've been quiet for 6 turns. Waves grow bigger as the game goes on.
• Arrival protocol - when your warship (Scout, Destroyer or Battlestar) arrives at a planet held by another faction (colony or station), you must declare intent: a binding 12-month local truce (attacking them there during it = breach), or open war (no UN response, but their defenses fire on your warships every turn you stay). When a truce lapses you choose again.
• Colonial protection - a newly founded colony is under UN guardianship for its first 24 turns (2 years): attacking its faction at that planet is a breach - peacekeepers respond - even in open war. Settlements still unpacking their crates are not legitimate targets.
• Recidivism - actually SEIZING protected territory goes on your permanent record. Offense #1: that conquest pacifies at half speed and the UN responds normally. Each further offense slows ALL your still-pacifying breach conquests again, adds enforcers to the punitive wave, and keeps peacekeepers hunting you longer. Do it once and things eventually return to normal; make a habit of it and you will wish you hadn't.
• Repossession - until a conquest pacifies to 75% (the UN recognition threshold), the annexation is UNRECOGNIZED: the dispossessed faction may lawfully retake it - no breach, no record, even through a truce - and a successful repossession restores the territory exactly as it was before the seizure. A standard conquest is recognized after ~57 turns; breach conquests pacify slower, so ill-gotten territory stays reclaimable for years longer. Once recognized, retaking it is ordinary war.
• "UN Truce Declared" - a random event can impose a system-wide 12-month truce, likelier when there has been recent fighting.
• Wars still cost influence - destroying ships triggers 5x Earth Influence decay for 10 turns, truce or no truce.

Trade & Mining Rights:

• Propose Trade (U) - with a ship orbiting where a foreign faction has a ship, colony, or station (and no local war), buy ore or water with energy, or sell for energy. The other side posts a price - no haggling. Rates tilt against whichever party is closer to winning, rise when the seller has no colony producing that resource, and worsen if there's a wildcat-mining grudge between you. One deal per faction pair per 6 turns, 150 units max per deal.
• The UN water counter - at Earth, U also reaches the UN Station: it sells water from Earth's oceans at a flat rate (no markups, no cooldown) and buys nothing.
• Enforced claims - a planet whose owner has a colony, operational station, military outpost, or battlestar in orbit is ENFORCED: foreign ships mine it at a heavily reduced rate ("wildcat mining"). A bare flag, scout, or destroyer does NOT enforce - flags reserve colonization rights, not minerals.
• Grudges - wildcat mining builds a grudge with the claim's owner (it fades over time). A grudge means worse trade prices from that faction, or outright refusal.
• Battlestars watch everything - grudge builds 3x while the owner's battlestar is in orbit. When one arrives over your mining operation you are warned immediately: stop that turn (X) and you were never noticed.

Ship Types:

• Scout - Fast, weak combat (ATK: 15, DEF: 25), plants claim flags
• Destroyer - Escort (ATK: 45, DEF: 60), best point-defense in the fleet; screens colonies and convoys but cannot bombard or board
• Battlestar - Combat focused (ATK: 75, DEF: 75), can build Scouts
• Colony Ship - Establishes colonies, no combat (the UN grants each faction a free one, arriving at Earth between turns 12-20; building your own at a frontier yard also takes 100 water)
• Light Freighter - 350 cargo, fast inner-system hauler (70% salvage)
• Heavy Freighter - 960 cargo, long-range bulk hauler (85% salvage - tempting target!)

Factions:

Each faction has a unique bonus and minor drawback:

• Solar Dynamics Corp - +15% solar, +25% fusion output, mastered Regolith Hydrogen Plants (cheaper to build, 4 E/water vs 10), -10% minerals
• Asteroid Mining Guild - +10% minerals, -10% solar
• Mars Colonial Authority - -20% colony ship cost, -10% ship speed
• Outer Reach Explorers - +15% engine reliability, -25% Fusion Reactor cost, -10% defense, -15% minerals
• United Defense Force - +15% combat, -12% collection, -25% engine reliability
• Titan Industries - +20% ship build, +25% engine reliability, -20% station build
• Free Traders Union - +30% cargo, +25% trade rates, -25% colony ship cost, -7% attack, -30% engine reliability

Victory Points:

• Colony - Full planet VP (e.g., Mars=10, Pluto=25)
• Station - 25% of planet VP
• Capture - Take an undefended enemy colony OR station. A fresh conquest yields only 50% VP (restive world) but PACIFIES toward 85% over ~7 years of uninterrupted ownership - conquest pays off if you hold it. Capturing during a truce is a breach (peacekeepers!).
• Destroy - Enemy loses VP when station destroyed
• Turn Limit - If nobody wins by turn 1200 (100 years), the faction closest to victory takes the game (final standings shown).
• Catch-up - Colonies of factions trailing the overall leader collect up to +50% more resources (the leader gets nothing). Runaway leads are hard to keep - yours included.
• Gas giants have orbital colonies (no surface landing)

Sovereignty Charter (Alternative Victory):

• Earth Influence - Deliver iron/silicon to Earth's UN Station (press E at Earth)
• Points - Iron gives 0.04 pts, Silicon 0.08 pts per unit. A full Heavy Freighter of silicon is ~77 influence - Sovereignty takes a SUSTAINED trade economy (colonies mining, freighters shuttling to Earth), not one big load.
• Exploration firsts - The first faction to put a ship in orbit of each planet earns permanent VP: +2 inner system, +3 beyond the belt. Discovery is history!
• Goal - Reach 200 Earth Influence for Sovereignty Charter victory. Also required: your oldest colony is 10+ years old, you have structures on 3+ planets, nearly all factions have colonies, and you lead the runner-up by 25+ influence.
• Decay - Influence decays 1.5% per turn; military actions cause 5x decay for 10 turns
• UN Missions - Complete special requests for bonus Earth Influence

Controls:

• Tab - Select next idle ship/colony
• T - Cycle through target planets
• V - Plan travel to selected target
• C - Collect resources (choose mineral if multiple available; solar always collected too)
• B - Open build menu
• D / W / R - Transfer dialog: move resources between your ship and any nearby ship, station, or colony. Pick a target and direction, then choose how much of each resource. (D opens on the local depot to deposit, W to withdraw, R on a nearby ship.)
• E - Deliver remittances to Earth (at Earth only)
• U - Propose a trade with a co-located foreign faction (buy ore with energy, or sell ore for energy; see Trade & Mining Rights above)
• P - Plant flag (Scout only, minor claim)
• O - Colonize planet (Colony Ship only)
• K - Bombard the enemy structure here from orbit. Wears down its hull over several turns; it answers with one capped defensive volley per turn (spread across all besiegers). One warship can't crack a fortress alone — bring 2-3. War only.
• G - Capture an undefended enemy colony or station here (clear its ships first). You take its point-defense volley — a full station is a fortress, but one you've BOMBARDED down (or that already fired this turn) boards cheaply. During a truce this is a breach (peacekeepers!).
• F - Attack nearby enemy ship
• Shift+F - Fire colony lasers at enemy ships
• X - Cancel current activity
• N - Rename ship or structure
• A - Toggle auto-advance
• Enter/Space - Advance to next turn
• +/-/Mouse wheel - Zoom in/out
• Mouse drag - Pan the view
• 0 - Fit solar system in view (reset pan)
• F - Center view on selected ship (also: the "Ship" zoom button, or click the Ship/Location readouts in the status bar or the ship popup's title)
• G - Center view on target planet
• Lost a ship? - Tab cycles idle units and jumps the view to each one; in the System Overview (J) click any row to jump to that ship, colony, or planet. A blue pulse marks whatever you jumped to.
• Shift+S - Quick save (not during combat)
• Shift+L - Quick load
• Autosave - The game saves itself every turn; if the browser closes, pick "autosave" from the Load Game menu.
• I - Strategic Advisor
• J - System Overview (ships, colonies & planet resources; filterable by faction, click a column header to sort, click a row to jump the view to that unit)
• L - Message Log (review older status messages)
• M - Toggle Mini Map
• ? - Show this help

Auto-Advance:

When enabled, turns advance automatically every 1.5 seconds. Auto-advance pauses when something important happens (ship arrives, resources depleted, cargo full, etc.).

Resources:

• Energy - Powers your ship and is used for building. Solar panels always collect energy alongside mining.
• Iron - Primary construction material
• Silicon - Used for advanced structures
• Water - Settler provisioning: every Colony Ship needs 100 (the free UN grant arrives provisioned, and the UN yard folds water into its flexible payment - only settlers built at YOUR stations and colonies need it in kind). Mine it at icy worlds (Ceres is the belt's water tower; Vesta is bone dry; the outer system is awash), or buy it flat at the UN Station (U at Earth). Earth sells water and never buys it.

Building:

• Ships - Built at Space Stations (2-24 turns depending on hull; colonies and battlestars build slower)
• Stations - Built at any planet (15 turns). Ship must stay until 50% (8 turns), then it's self-sufficient.
• Station Defense - Defenses scale up as construction progresses; a completed station is a planetary fortress that shrugs off a lone raider. To take one, an enemy must either seize it while it's still weak (early construction / undefended) or BOMBARD it (K) with a 2-3 warship assault over several turns — its return fire will cost the attacker ships.
• UN Station - Shared by all, but builds at half speed
• Mining Operation - 2x resource collection speed. Built by stations (faster) or battlestars.
• Military Outpost - +20 ATK, +25 DEF in local combat. Built by stations or battlestars.
• Resources - Multiple ships can contribute (press B). Use D/W to transfer.
• Who pays what? - Station/Mine/Outpost construction is fed by ships: press H (Contribute) to pour a ship's resources into an in-progress build. Colony upgrades and the colony shipyard are paid from the COLONY's stockpile - a docked ship automatically covers any shortfall when you start the build, or deposit ahead of time with D.

Colonies:

• Starting Resources - New colonies receive 250E, 75Fe, 50Si from the colony ship
• Passive Generation - Colonies run a core power plant (steady energy even in the dark outer system) and sustainably process local ore each turn. This income does NOT deplete the planet's reserve (that's for active ship mining) - a colony is a perpetual producer, so founding more colonies is the long game.
• Storage - Base: 8000E, 1500Fe, 1500Si (expandable with Storage Bays). Deposit/withdraw with D/W.
• Colony Upgrades - Build sub-structures via Build menu (B) when a ship orbits your colony
• Solar Array - +20 energy/turn per array, scaled by the planet's sunlight (max 3). The inner-system power play: +20 each at Earth, +8.6 at Mars, near-zero past the belt.
• Mining Drill - +6 mineral/turn per drill (max 3). The mining budget splits across ORE types only - water never dilutes it.
• Water trickle - a colony on a world with water harvests +4 water/turn on its own separate budget.
• Ice Harvester - +6 water/turn each (max 2). Only offered on worlds with water - the first planet-conditional upgrade.
• Regolith Hydrogen Plant - converts energy to water (up to 4/turn each, max 2) by baking solar-wind hydrogen out of sun-blasted regolith. Only on Mercury and Venus (any faction), but Solar Dynamics has mastered the tech: cheaper to build, and 4 energy per water instead of 10.
• Storage Bay - +1500E, +800Fe, +800Si capacity (max 2)
• Fusion Reactor - +100 energy/turn, burns 7 ore/turn (max 2). Vital beyond the belt - but two reactors eat 14 ore/turn vs a colony's base 10 mining, so plan drills or freighter-fed ore.
• Defense Battery - +1 point-defense laser and +50 hull each (max 3). Fortifies a colony against attack and makes it far harder to capture.
• Shipyard - Colonies build Scouts & Freighters (and, once 5+ years old, Colony Ships) from their own stockpiles (slowly - 3x base time), one project at a time. Click a colony to build, or select a ship there and press B - the docked ship covers any resource shortfall automatically.
• Funding construction - A colony automatically pours its stored resources into any Station your ships are building at the same planet - colonize, then raise a station there without hauling in materials.

Solar System:

• Inner Planets - Mercury to Mars, good solar energy
• Asteroid Belt - Vesta, Ceres, Pallas - rich in minerals
• Gas Giants - Jupiter, Saturn - rich moon-mined ore but almost no sunlight, so a colony there leans on Fusion Reactors for power
• Outer Planets - Uranus, Neptune, Pluto - distant but resource-rich. Warning: very low solar energy!

Travel:

Ships use 3-phase travel: accelerate to cruise speed, coast (no fuel), then decelerate to match the target. Longer trips have more coasting, saving energy.

Engine wear: firing engines always carries a small chance of minor hull damage — even at normal thrust. Pushing thrust past "High" adds heavier wear and, past "Intense", a risk of catastrophic failure. A faction's engine reliability scales all of this, so reliable factions (Outer Reach, Titan) stay healthier while unreliable ones (UDF, Free Traders) nick themselves more often. Stations and colonies repair ships over time.

Combat:

When ships from different factions are within range, they can engage in combat.

• Weapons - Laser (6-12 dmg), Railgun (8-16, 17% crit), Missile (20-36, delayed)
• Miss Chance - All attacks have 10% chance to miss
• Critical Hits - 2% base chance (17% for railgun)
• Combat continues until one ship is destroyed or retreats
• Retreating costs 100 energy
• Colony Defenses - Colonies have 3 lasers (8-16 dmg each), +1 per Defense Battery, that auto-fire during combat and answer bombardment.
• Station Defenses - Stations are fortresses: heavy hull, 4 lasers + 6 missiles. Ships can't duel a structure round-by-round — they BOMBARD it (K). A structure fires just ONE defensive volley per turn, capped per target so it can never destroy a ship in a single turn (a battlestar always survives at least a few turns). It focuses that volley to pick attackers off one by one, so a lone raider is repelled but a 2-3 ship assault can grind it down over a multi-turn siege — at the cost of ships.
• Bombard (K) - Pound an enemy structure from orbit each turn. Bring numbers: one warship can't out-damage a fortress's repair + return fire. Bombard it low, then Capture (G) it cheaply — or reduce it to rubble.
• Shift+F - Fire colony lasers offensively at enemies orbiting your colonies

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