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The subject of this article is from the Adrift update.
The information from this article is up-to-date as of 16 July, 2024.
Nanite Cluster
Nanite Cluster
Category Special
Type Technological Currency
Rarity Rare
Used for Upgrading
Symbol
Updated Adrift

Nanite Cluster is a resource and an alternative form of currency.

Summary[ | ]

Nanite Cluster () is a resource and one of the special elements. It is also a secondary currency (NANITES).

Game Description[ | ]

A dense miasma of Nanites, undulating in its potentiality. These clusters are stable, but unrestricted nanite foam can produce undesirable runaway reactions in the presence of organic matter.

Used in the construction of advanced technologies. Highly valuable to specialist traders.

Usage[ | ]

20170411113926 1

Blueprint Trader at a Gek Station

Source[ | ]

Nanite Cluster can be acquired by:

  • Searching abandoned buildings on planets.
  • Uploading Discoveries
  • Discovering all creatures on a planet and claiming the rewarded nanites.
  • Feeding certain animals, which will lead you to a buried object that yields them.
  • Searching Damaged Machinery.
  • Destroying Sentinels.
  • Destroying Freighter cargo containers with no resource tag.
  • Reward for completing missions.
  • Can be found in storage containers while exploring Crashed Freighters.
  • Selling Upgrade Modules to Technology Merchants.
  • From certain Space Encounters.
  • Through multiple steps of refining, Residual Goop can be converted to Viscous Fluids, to Living Slime, to Runaway Mould and then to Nanite Cluster.
  • Payment during certain NPC missions.
  • Consuming the item Chewy Wires from your inventory.

Nanite Cluster can be refined using a Refiner with the following ingredients:

  • SPACEGUNK.2 Runaway Mould ×5  →  NANITE Nanite Cluster ×1  ("Recycle Waste Materials", 0.6 sec./unit output)
  • SUBSTANCE.ASTEROID.3 Platinum ×35  →  NANITE Nanite Cluster ×1  ("Reality Warping", 0.24 sec./unit output)
  • SUBSTANCE.ASTEROID.3 Platinum ×25  +  SUBSTANCE.ASTEROID.2 Gold ×15  +  SUBSTANCE.ASTEROID.1 Silver ×15  →  NANITE Nanite Cluster ×1  ("Transmutation", 0.36 sec./unit output)
  • PRODUCT.HEXCORE Hexite ×1  +  SUBSTANCE.PLANT.POOP Faecium ×1  →  NANITE Nanite Cluster ×1  ("Alchemical Construction", 0.24 sec./unit output)
  • SUBSTANCE.ROBOT.1 Pugneum ×25  →  NANITE Nanite Cluster ×1  ("Reality Filtering", 0.12 sec./unit output)
  • PRODUCT.FIENDCORE Larval Core ×1  →  NANITE Nanite Cluster ×50  ("NOT RECOMMENDED", 0.24 sec./unit output)
  • PRODUCT.FISHCORE Hadal Core ×1  →  NANITE Nanite Cluster ×50  ("Doom Cycling", 0.24 sec./unit output)
  • PRODUCT.SALVAGE Salvaged Data ×1  →  NANITE Nanite Cluster ×15  ("Nanite Extraction", 1.28 sec./unit output)
  • Tainted metal Tainted Metal ×1  →  NANITE Nanite Cluster ×2  ("Doom Cycling", 0.36 sec./unit output)
  • WORMCORE Flesh Rope ×1  →  NANITE Nanite Cluster ×50  ("Loosen Bonds", 0.36 sec./unit output)
  • WORMSPAWN Vile Spawn ×1  →  NANITE Nanite Cluster ×50  ("Loosen Bonds", 0.36 sec./unit output)
  • PRODUCT.DRONESHARD Radiant Shard ×1  →  NANITE Nanite Cluster ×50  ("Subjugation of Glass", 7.2 sec./unit output)
  • PRODUCT.DRONESALVAGE Inverted Mirror ×1  →  NANITE Nanite Cluster ×95  ("Purge Corruption", 8.8 sec./unit output)
  • PRODUCT.SENTINELSHIPBRAIN Hyaline Brain ×1  →  NANITE Nanite Cluster ×230  ("Sentience Extraction", 12.8 sec./unit output)

Lore[ | ]

I look down at the Nanite Clusters, puzzled. They look nothing like the shells of Sentinel drones. They are just currency, traded between species to create technology and weapons... aren't they? They shift and undulate, changing their shape at my every thought. They bubble and rise, sparking in and out of existence... I look at them, and it's the strangest thing... The Nanite Clusters look back, I'm sure of it. They watch me as I watch them. The Nanite Clusters are alive. They are sixteen of them. They... they need me. They crave me.
~ Traveller (Player)

In the storyline quest Patterns in Time, the Explorers Guild's representative, a Korvax, uses Nanite Cluster manipulation to reveal to the player glimpses of their race's past. They suggest that these clusters come from Sentinel casings.

Later in the same quest, the Merchants Guild's representative, a Gek, uses their pheromones to reveal to the player the truth behind the fall of the First Spawn. The enslaved Korvax entities sacrificed themselves in the spawning pools of Balaron and used the Nanite Clusters from their bodies to rewrite the biology of the Gek. This led to the downfall of the First Spawn Empire.

The Travellers often utilize and manipulate Nanite Clusters.

More than likely, nanites are some form of information processing nanobot, like an artificial neuron. This can be inferred by the “nan” part, the fact that they can store information (presumably by their connections and position), and the mind-like behavior of the nanites during their encounter with the traveler.

Acquisition Tips[ | ]

Iteration: Cronus and Cooking[ | ]

Cooking for Iteration: Cronus is an excellent way to earn Nanites. If the player has the resources, they can quickly and easily produce Flavoursome Sauce. Combining it with Mystery Meat Stew can make the highly valuable Herb-Encrusted Flesh, giving 50-320 nanites/unit. With this method, one can get 25,000 nanites with 250 Herb-Encrusted Flesh, which is just 500 Meaty Chunks and 500 Steamed Vegetables. It is easy for late game players and early-mid game can yield a reasonable amount of Nanites.

Salvaging spaceships[ | ]

A decent way of converting units to Nanite Clusters is to purchase Starships at Space stations and scrapping them. It is recommended to be in a high-wealth system for better class ships and to have at least 200m units before starting. This will allow you to go for hours without restocking units, however this can be done efficiently with as little as 75m units.

Start by buying any ship in the Space Station, smaller ships and ships with few inventory slots, like shuttles, can be magnitudes cheaper than larger ships like haulers, Currently, there seems to be no benefit in choosing the larger ships other than convenience. Next, go to the large orange interface displaying the ship you just bought near the character customizer.

Confirm that you would like to scrap the ship along with its contents. This operation yields a minimum of one (1) and a maximum of five (5) upgrade modules, with the module grade matching the grade of the salvaged ship. These modules will have random sell values from 30-1,300 Nanites each, depending on class. . They function identically to the ones bought at the Technology Merchants so it's recommended to trade them instead of installing.

In addition about 75% of of your units are recovered in sellable items, However it is not recommended to dump your scrapped material in the same system economy twice, as prices for your bulk items will be reduced by as much as -80%.

This method can get you upwards of 30,000 Nanites/hr, making it a strong contender for the best method in the game for acquiring Nanites.

Salvaging higher grade ships also gives a higher chance of receiving a Storage Augmentation module.

Refining Salvage Data[ | ]

Salvaged Data is in Buried Technology, found on most planets and most often near damaged machinery. 1-4 Salvage data is received from each Buried Technology. A Salvage Data can be refined into 15 Nanite Clusters each as well as used to unlock certain technology, making this an extremely fast and safe way to progress through the early game while gathering a reasonable amount of nanites.

This method is capable of at least 1000 Nanite Clusters an hour without proper jetpack upgrades.

Discovering all creatures on a planet or moon[ | ]

While discovering all creatures on an astral body can yield up to 4,750 nanite clusters (avg ~2,000), it can take many hours, especially when creatures are underground or underwater.

Curious Deposit - Runaway Mould[ | ]

While finding a Curious Deposit of Runaway Mould can be difficult, once you find one you can easily gather over 200,000 Runaway Mould per hour earning 40,000+ nanite clusters during that time. You need to have basic base building and basic refiner unlocked since you need to mark the deposit. You will also need a way to refine Runaway Mould into nanite clusters and preferably have a teleporter next to it. The curious deposit will respawn if you teleport off of the planet, then back to your base at the deposit. One can also use a Save Beacon or your Starship then reload your restore point, which may be much faster. This works well since it is relatively fast. While it takes 20 minutes to refine a stack of Runaway Mould into about 2000 nanite clusters, you can run many refineries simultaneously to refine several stacks at the same time, dramatically increasing the yield.

Fighting Sentinels[ | ]

Killing Sentinel Drones and Heavy Drones yields Combat Supplies, which yield Nanites and Salvaged Glass, which yields Upgrades, which can be sold for Nanites. Rapidly killing large amounts of Sentinels is very profitable, rivaling the starship scrapping strategy. While slightly less profitable than ground combat, luring and fighting Sentinel Interceptors around a Space Station can also prove effective.

Ground Strategy:

  • Get two Summoner Drones in one place. One is not enough.
  • Keep the summoners alive while killing other drones and looting supplies.

Tips:

  • At the time of writing, two summoners seem to reliably spawn at Wanted level 3 on planets with aggressive Sentinels. This may change with future game updates.
  • You can stand in place and "tank" the damage, remotely looting Combat Supplies to recover.
  • To avoid being thrown off by terrain destruction, stand on something indestructible, such as:
    • Towering pre-built structures.
    • Your Starship.
    • An Exocraft platform, after moving the Exocraft elsewhere.
  • Standing on a small patch of high ground makes it easier to remotely loot Combat Supplies, which should fall to the low ground around you.
    • If no high ground is available, you can make one. Place your Starship or an Exocraft platform on terrain and dig/flatten the terrain underneath and around. The ship/platform will stay in the air.
  • A well-upgraded Neutron Cannon is excellent at remotely looting supplies. Take care to avoid killing summoner drones with splash damage.

Space Strategy:

  • Fighting the Interceptors will need a combat capable Starship. Make sure you have a Phase Beam equipped to keep your shields topped up during sustained combat.
  • To summon the Interceptors, fire a few shots towards the System Starbase. This should summon a set of interceptors to defend the station.
    • Staying within a few dozen kilometers of the Station will cause the Sentinels to indefinitely spawn nearby.
    • The amount of interceptors active at one time depends on the damage done to the station, starting at only 2 and ramping up to 16 at Wanted level 5.
    • While possible to fight more, try to keep 7-9 interceptors active at Wanted Level 3.
  • Keep neutralizing the Interceptors. They should drop various resources, such as a Hyaline Brain and Salvaged Glass that could be refined into Nanite clusters, or even drop Nanites directly.

Tips:

  • Starship Loadout:
    • At this time, I would highly recommend having more than 7500 DPS available on a secondary weapon, in addition to the Phase Beam.
    • Have a second way to recharge your shields available in case you get overrun or can't lock onto a shielded Interceptor before your shields go down.
  • Combat:
    • With the Phase Beam, fire on any of the shielded targets to recharge your own.
    • Control the overheating of the Phase Beam with shorter bursts, this will allow you to fully charge your shields from a single Interceptor.
    • Try to engage the Sentinels as early as possible as they approach. This will make it easier to switch between shielded and unshielded targets, as they will remain more closely grouped together.
    • Avoid damaging the Station as not to raise your Wanted level beyond what your ship can handle.

Outlaw Station module trading[ | ]

The black market traders at the space stations in Outlaw systems carry stocks of "suspicious packets" of arms and tech(5+5), and can be purchased for normal currency. Most of these packets reduce to upgrade modules, that then can be sold to tech merchants on regular space stations for nanites. (Outlaw Systems are infrequent, but can be located easily on the galaxy map by aquiring a conflict scanner and searching for the pirate flag "conflict activity" label.) The traders on Outlaw Stations restock at an unknown (if regular) interval. But shifting suspicious packets is a conflict, grind and hassle-free way of aquiring non-trivial amounts of nanite clusters while exploring systems. Will not attract the attention of station authorities.

Farming Chewy Wires[ | ]

Requires base building and locating a planet with synthetic life forms. Normally they can be found around blue Uncharted Systems.

Strategy:

  • Build a base with a Base Teleport Module, a source of power, an Automated Feeder and a Livestock Unit module.
  • Use Carbon to make Creature Pellets and fill the feeder.
  • Sit nearby in your starship so that you're protected from the elements.
  • Periodically collect the Chewy Wires and restock the pellets.
  • RECOMMENDED: Get an auto clicker to click all the Chewy Wires in your inventory.
  • Come back 20 minutes later and refresh.
  • Yields ~9,000 nanites in 20m of clicking.

Release History[ | ]

  • Pathfinder - Introduced as a resource, which can be used as a currency.
  • NEXT - Value changed, previously it was worth 137.5 Units each. It can be refined. After refinement the resource type Naninte Cluster no longer takes up inventory slots and converted immediately to its currency type. It cannot be purchased or sold. Classified as Raw Material according to the in-game guide.
  • Visions - Hidden changes: The information panel has an additional icon indicating its purpose.
  • Beyond - Hidden changes: Value is removed from the information panel. Conversion for Platinum > Nanite Clusters changed from 5>1 to 35>1.

Gallery[ | ]

Videos[ | ]

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