Scavenger SV-4 – Rover Guide

Other SV-4 Guides:

• Basic Survival & Tips.
• Ship Guide.

The Rover

All credit goes to Clatronix!

Equipement

Starting equipement on the first, second time you launch the Rover shouldn’t be anything special. You need the space for items you pick up. I personally prefer this setup:

• Reserve battery
• Video camera
• Manipulator arms
• Survey map (optional)
• Radio reciever / Microphone (both optinal)

I ususally leave the Aux generator and the Reciever / Microphone (whichever I don’t have installed on the Rover) in the ship’s storage for later use. I don’t bring / discard the Power controller, Compass and Status display. They take up space and you can get by without them.

This way you’ll have 7 to 9 free slots on the Rover to pick up items. After your 1st / 2nd recall, you can start outfitting your Rover with equipement you found and researched.

The video feed will have constant static and interference due to the high levels of radiation on the surface. This is by design and can’t really be changed.

Handling

The Rover by default is a bit slow and doesn’t turn well. It’s not very capable “off-road”, so small hills and rough terrain should be avoided, since it can get you stuck.

If you are stuck, recall the Rover and launch it again. If it’s still stuck, recall again and click on “Reset Landing Zone” in the terminal menu. The Rover will now land on it’s original landing position (when it first landed on the planet).

Driving into cravasses will destroy the Rover, so be careful when driving near cliffs and steep edges.
Having a lot of modules installed will impact the Rover’s speed and turning. It’s not a huge decrease, but it is noticable.

Power Management & Heat

The Rover generates a small amount of power by itself, but thats usually only enough to power the most basic of modules.

Remaining power can be displayed when a power source / power storage is assigned to a screen.
If the Rover doesn’t have some sort of power source, modules will lose power quickly and eventually stop working. The more output power the generator has, the more modules you can power. You only need to power modules you currently want to use.

While driving the Rover, clicking the green square next to a module or pressing the corresponding number key will turn that module on / off. Disabling modules with high power demands will decrease power use, re-enable them when you actually need them.

Actively manage your powered modules and you’ll be able to get around with a less reliable power source.

The internal temperature of the Rover is shown in the upper left corner of the terminal.
Modules will procude heat when they are turned on (sometimes even when turned off) or when actively being used. You can counter this by only powering them when necessary or installing heatsinks on the Rover.
When the Rover is entering the planets atmosphere after launch, its temperature will rise, but drop back down shortly after passing the clouds.

If the temperature reaches critical levels, modules will start taking damage and eventually the Rover will be destroyed. Keep an eye on your temperature when using reactors and weapons.
If the Rover is already hot, reentry might destroy it.

Screens

The layout of the uplink screens is displayed below on the terminal.

The Rover uplink has a total of 6 screens and you can assign most installed modules to them (a single module can’t be assigned to multiple screens). If a module can’t be assigned to screens, the icon on their right side will have red marks on it.

The middle screen is the largest, followed by the one on the right.

To assign a module to a screen, either:

• Clicking on a module, then clicking on a screen
• Pressing the button on the right of the Module, then clicking on a screen
• Dragging the module onto a screen
• Dragging a screen onto a module

You can swap displays around by dragging a screen onto another.
To unassign a module from a screen, click the icon on the right of the module twice.

To expand the center screen temporarily, click on the small rectangle in the bottom left of it. The screen will now fill the whole terminal screen whenever you enter turret mode.

Combat

Once you have weapons, armor and maybe a targeting computer installed, you can try taking on enemies. Sentries and Fliers are fair game, but avoid Guardians if you can. You don’t get any rewards for combat efficiency, so stay away from trouble when possible. It’s easy to lose your Rover if you get overzealus, a few well palced shots will damage your Rover beyond belief, destroy modules or even blow it up completely. If that happens, the expedition is over. No replacement Rovers, can’t land on the surface either, so you better just take whatever you have in your cargo and get out.