At some point during your adventures in Starfield you're likely gonna want to build yourself an outpost. It may not seem like the most exciting thing, we avoided it for as long as we possibly could, but the fact is Outposts are incredibly useful for a host of reasons. Let's take a look at how they work and where we reckon is best to build them.
Starfield: How To Build An Outpost, Best Outpost Locations
How To Build An Outpost
First things first, how to actually build an outpost. It's as simple as opening up your scanner on the planet of your choice and tapping the X button to enter the outpost building menu. Remember here that we're looking for resource rich areas, so find a patch of resources with your scanner then settle into building.
We have a nice list of planets further down this guide that have lots of resources to make use of, so make sure to check that out once you're up and running.
Once you're in the building menu, you can choose from lots of different bits and pieces, buildings, power generators, landing pads scanners and so on to set about creating your habitat. Everything you build costs materials and the full cost is listed as you scroll through each menu.
Your first choices should be an extractor, to mine resources, and a power supply to keep it running, then you can start thinking about extras like scanner boosters and buildings that you can then stuff full of potatoes, plushies and plants. That's why we're really here, right?
If you've built anything in No Man's Sky you'll know the deal with how building works here as control and manipulation of various assets is very much the same, and very straightforward overall.
A quick note; sometimes you won't be allowed to build on a planet if the conditions are too extreme, you may also need to relocate if the terrain isn't suitable. To remedy this make sure to rank up the Planetary Habitation skill, so you can build on harsh planets.
Why Build An Outpost?
Outposts aren't in any way essential to completing the game so why should you waste time with them? Well, they provide lots of big benefits, such as material gathering which will boost your ability to create weapon mods. They'll give you tons of extra storage, they'll enable you to fully scan a planet in detail rather than plodding around with your scanner open on foot, and they also give you access to cargo links.
Cargo links work by allowing you to ferry materials and resources around through as many outposts as you choose to build, and they're as easy to set up as simply building a Cargo Link Intersystem at each base so they can then get busy interacting with each other. You may even want to staff your outposts to increase productivity, and all of this feeds back into giving you lots of resources to use in more exciting areas of the game, like pimping your guns to shoot things in the face.
With regards to the habitats you build, well, they make for instant travel points that you can access via fast travel. You can place workbenches of every variety in them too, so you're giving yourself a network of pitstops and crafting areas. Very useful.
Best Outpost Skills
By which we mean, the best skills to get unlocking and upgrading to make the most of your outposts once they're up and running.
Outpost Management
An obvious one, as you rank this up you'll be able to crew and eventually massively boost your resource production rates.
Outpost Engineering
Another obvious one, engineering allows you to build more outposts, as well as making construction cheaper in terms of the amount of resources it requires.
Special Projects
Allows you to create a wider range of bits and bobs and research more projects. It also boosts your resource output when it's been upgraded to the max.
Botany
Allows you to cultivate plants of your choosing so you don't have to trek them down in the wild.
Planetary Habitation
Build in harsh environments and get a big boost to the number of outposts you can build in total.
Best Outpost Locations
Below we've listed the planets we reckon are the best to make a beeline for when it comes to building outposts.
Jemison - Alpha Centauri System
An obvious one to start with. This planet is teeming with resources, flora and fauna so make sure to plonk down you first outpost here.
Zamka - Alpha Centauri System
Another planet in the Alpha Centauri system, Zamka is rich in Iron, Aluminium and Helium-3, one of the game's most important resources.
Callisto - Sol System
Lots of Iron, lots of Helium-3 AND it's low levelled so there's not too much chance of you getting ravaged by beats and/or bandits when you visit.
Andraphon - Narion System
This moon is nice and barren and boring, easy to build on as a result, and it's got lots of lovely Iron, Aluminium, Benzene and Europium to suck out of its innards.
Kreet - Narion System
Helium-3 is once again the main draw here, but there are lots of other resources to scan and start making use of.
Maheo II - Maheo System
Lots of lovely Helium-3 to get busy digging into here, alongside lead, copper, iron and more.
Leviathan IV - Leviathan System
Leviathan IV has lots of resources, a very similar list to Zamka in fact, but it also has Fluorine and Ytterbium, both of which are incredibly useful for crafting.
Decaran III - Decaran System
This is one for late in the game as it's very high level, but once you're up to scrapping with level 80 baddies, you can pick up quite a few rare resources here, alongside staples such as lead, copper and cobalt.
Comments 4
I would suggest Bessel III-b as a good starter outpost for farming resources, xp & credits. It's a moon in the Bessel system which you will find a little ways above Sol.
It has aluminium, iron, nickel & cobalt ( as well as others) but the four mentioned are good for outpost building.
The trick here is you want to find a landing site that straddles the 3 biomes (mountains, hills & rocky desert.) It can be a bit tricky but just click around landing sites till you find them in close proximity so you barely have to move the cursor to hit each one. The plop your landing site there.
Then it's a case of running around with the outpost beacon till you find a site that hits the main 4 resources I mentioned and you are good to start setting up a mining resource hub. Again this can be tricky but keep running around & you should find a spot.
You can use those resources to set up your hub with extractors, power, a bed, an industrial work bench & storage. Start small & scale up as you get the resources.
Once set up craft items for xp which you can sell for credits at the nearby settled systems.
The absolute best thing that sets this one above all other sites is the time factor.
Once you have set up your extractors you usually sleep to pass time so your extractors mine the resources. They work off universal time (UT) rather than local time & every hour of UT that passes will get you resources.
So on this moon 1 hour of local time equals 58 hours of UT so as you can imagine this will net you a crap ton of resources with little downtime.
I only know of one better place but it's on a high level planet with extreme weather so you need to invest skills.
Bessel 3b you can literally set up right out of the tutorial mission as long as you get some initial supplies from Jemison.
Sorry for the essay & good luck with your outposts. They are a lot of fun & profitable.
They made storage such a pain in the butt that I can't be bothered with settlements.
Edit: outposts I mean...
@BBB Thanks for the advice, worked like a charm!
Two bonus tips.
1. If you are having trouble finding a site with all the resources I mentioned (which is the hardest part of the process). Don't worry you can set up multiple outposts & use the cargo link mentioned in the article to get all the resources you need. Ideally getting them on one site just saves on the set up cost & time but don't worry if you have to use two outposts.
2. When it comes to selling your crafted items you will quickly find that you will get encumbered rather quickly after a mega craft session.
So your CO2 levels drop really quickly. While it does damage your health you will never die from this mechanic it will just leave you at very low health.
So long as you can walk to a vendor without taking any additional damage (so no fighting or fall damage) you will be fine. In addition there is a power that restores CO2 that is very helpful in this situation so you don't have to slow walk so much (This is more an end game convenience rather than a necessity though so again no worries if you don't have it )
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