---
title: 'Intermediate Help Guide'
---

# Intermediate Help Guide

Author: United Federation

Now that you have gotten your colonies started and you are starting to expand. I thought we should
go over some of the more advanced [buildings](/wiki/buildings/) and features of the game to further
enhance your gameplay.

**REPLACING INEFFICIENT [BUILDINGS](/wiki/buildings/)**

First things first you need to go through and start to get rid of some of your original
[buildings](/wiki/buildings/) and upgrade them with better ones such as:

- Replacing [Water Purification Plant](/wiki/water-purification-plant/)s with Water Production
  Facilitys (For [Gas Giants](/wiki/gas-giants/))
- Replacing Water Purification/[Water Production Plant](/wiki/water-production-plant/)s with
  Atmospheric Renewers (For Non [Gas Giants](/wiki/gas-giants/))
- Replacing [Geo Energy Plant](/wiki/geo-energy-plant/)s with Fusion or Fission Planets or
  [Singularity Energy Plant](/wiki/singularity-energy-plant/)s if available
- Replacing Recycling Centers with [Waste Digester](/wiki/waste-digester/)s or
  [Waste Exchanger](/wiki/waste-exchanger/)s if available

There are otheer [buildings](/wiki/buildings/) that you can get more efficiency by switching out but
you get the idea by the ones above.

**START PRODUCING EXCAVATORS**

Producing [excavator](/wiki/excavator/)s will be a big help for the expansion of your empire. It
makes it where you can collect [glyph](/wiki/glyph/)s and use them to build [glyph](/wiki/glyph/)
building [plans](/wiki/plans/). In order to be able to produce [excavator](/wiki/excavator/)s you
need to have a level 11 [Archaeology Ministry](/wiki/archaeology-ministry/). Click
[HERE](/wiki/archaeology-ministry/) to see additional information about the Arch Ministry. Some
people choose to send [excavator](/wiki/excavator/)s manually but most do this through scripting.
_Scripting used to be mandatory for large scale [glyph](/wiki/glyph/) production, this hass been
changed however to make manual operation of [excavator](/wiki/excavator/)s relatively easy.
Scripting however is still possible to use in the game._

Scripting is not necessarily an easy thing to grasp but never fear... Help is available. You can
refer to the Why Script section of the Help Center Home section to choose which installation you
would like to do. You can also choose the ActiveState Perl installation page at the top of the
screen. Scripting is done through the Perl programming language. In some cases people are offering
to run scripts for you. Check with other members of your alliance and see if anyone in your alliance
may be offering to run scripts for you. If you need assistance, please mail United Federation in
game and I will be glad to assist with installation and helping you setup scripts on your own
computer.

**_GET YOUR DEFENSES IN ORDER_**

Whether it be from AIs or from other players. You should start to get serious about your defenses.
Whether it by [spies](/wiki/spies/) to protect your planets or building/buying [ships](/wiki/ships/)
to defend them. Youmust defend your empire or someone can come in and damage or take over your
planet one at a time. There are many different ways and strategy directions you can go into at this
point..

> **Setting Up a Good Amount of [Waste](/wiki/waste/) Storage**
>
> Its always a good thing to level up Interdimentional Rifts and [Ravine](/wiki/ravine/)s so they
> can store alot of [waste](/wiki/waste/) just in case you get scowed (trash dumped on your planets)
> or a [bleeder](/wiki/bleeder/) starts using your [resources](/wiki/resources/) and turns
> everything to garbage. The more [waste](/wiki/waste/) storage you have the better. As soon as your
> storage fills up then it will start affecting your [happiness](/wiki/happiness/) of the planet
> that is being attacked. If your [happiness](/wiki/happiness/) goes negative and is negative enough
> then someone can use [spies](/wiki/spies/) to try to take your planet from you.
>
> **Spy Defense**
>
> Your [security ministry](/wiki/security-ministry/) is a good building to upgrade to help the
> effectiveness of your spy defense. When someone sends [spies](/wiki/spies/) at you you wanna be
> able to stop whatever hostile acts they are trying against you. There is a bonus given to all
> [spies](/wiki/spies/) defending on their planets which also helps. Besides that, training your
> [spies](/wiki/spies/) is a great idea to help avoid possible issues going forward.
>
> **Increase SAWs**
>
> SAWs or Shields Against Weopons are your first line of defense against incoming
> [ships](/wiki/ships/). Getting several on a planet or several on multiple planets (Ring of Fire)
> is the best way to go to make the SAW defense more effective. Either way in this case, the more..
> the better.
>
> **Increase [Ships](/wiki/ships/) Protecting Each of your Planets**
>
> As you are developing [ships](/wiki/ships/) you start out with [drone](/wiki/drone/)s and weaker
> [fighter](/wiki/fighter/)s. At this point you should think about scuttling or selling those lower
> quality [ships](/wiki/ships/) for higher ones. Get some higher level [fighter](/wiki/fighter/)s
> and [sweeper](/wiki/sweeper/)s. I would suggest also having some [scow](/wiki/scow/)s at each
> planet. If not to get rid of [waste](/wiki/waste/) where you may otherwise not be able to, it can
> serve as insurance so if lots of [waste](/wiki/waste/) is being dropped on you that you can try to
> get rid of some of it before it damages you too much.

## Community notes

> **aksarben:** Excavators are now available when your Archeology ministry is at Level 11