User:Racc-Off/new artifacts

Artifacts

Artifacts are powerful and mysterious items, they are responsible for many phenomena including transforming people into corgis, or spontaneously creating missing persons cases.

Science can research with these items to gain various rewards, including both research and discovery points.

Anatomy

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Defining an artifact starts with its material. An artifact's material defines what 'rules' it follows in terms of what kind of traits it can have, and how many traits it can have.

material Type	Info
Bluespace	Bluespace artifacts are generally considered the safest type, as most of their traits and synergies are benevolent.
Plasma	Plasma artifacts are the easiest to weaponize, often containing dangerous traits that synergize together in an offensive manner.
Uranium	Uranium artifacts are even more dangerous than plasma artifacts, having access to most traits with no overarching patterns or pre-determined synergies. Uranium artifacts also start with a malfunction, and gain another later. (See below)
Bananium	Bananium artifacts are wild cards, they have no rules or restrictions regarding trait types.

The next aspect is an artifact's traits. Traits define an artifact's behaviour and characteristics, these traits fall into 1 of 4 categories, of which are-

Trait Type	Info
Activators	These define how an artifact 'activates'. Every artifact will have 1 of these.
Minors	These can define an artifact's physical characteristics, special secondary actions, or artifact function behaviour. Every artifact will have 3 of these.
Majors	These define an artifact's action, what it does. Every artifact will have 1 of these.
Malfunctions	These define what's wrong with an artifact. Most artifacts will not start with these, instead gaining 1 through repeated use without stabilization.

Traits

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Trait List (mouse over the sleuth entries for a brief explanation)

Name	Type	Description	Sleuthing	Materials
Sturdy	Activator	This activator responds to, almost, any tactile input. This trait is especially useful for weapons.

Research

As stated earlier, science can research with these items to gain various rewards.

Acquiring

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Obviously you'll need an artifact first, before you can begin research. Artifacts can be bought through 'the console' with the science budget, which will deliver artifacts through cargo. Otherwise, artifacts can be 'found', or even made.

Labelling

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Once you have an artifact, you'll need to label it, correctly, for it to have any value whatsoever. This is generally done by sleuthing out what traits the artifact has by examining, weighing, conducting, and generally testing it, which can be done with various items. If you don't want to accidentally activate the bomb artifact while doing this, be sure to wear a pair of anti-tactile pinchers , these will make most interactions safe, but only if they are enabled. Otherwise, activating the artifact, although dangerous, can also help you sleuth out what traits it has.

It's important to be wearing science goggles during this process, as they will generally translate vague hints and effects into exact trait names.

Processing

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Once the artifact is labeled, you have several options on how you'd like to process it.

Stabilizing

Stabilizing an artifact stops it from malfunctioning, and doubles any potential rewards gained from it. This is useful for artifacts you want to distribute across the station, without the risk of blowing a hole in the hull, or just maximizing profits before selling it. Successfully stabilizing an artifact will reward science with a small amount of discovery points.

Exporting

Exporting, selling, an artifact through cargo will not only give cargo a monetary kick back for doing your dirty work, it also awards science with research and discovery points.

Tracking

Once an artifact is stabilized, instead of selling it you can opt to 'track' it instead. Tracked artifacts will generate research and discovery points when activated, and, if enabled, will announce their location of science comms.

The Work

How to perform the work