Never Surrender Scenario

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Never Surrender Scenario is one of the PvE survival Story Scenarios with high-end content —endless waves of AI attack drones— created by Keen Software House.

This scenario can be played alone or you can open up the world to Multiplayer coop and play in a faction with friends. Special Steam Achievements are available for a series of winning conditions.

This is not a Sandbox Game that becomes your main save to “carefully design your favourite ships and bases” in, here you expect your ships to be eventually destroyed. Play this as a quick one-off challenge that you start and delete and restart, and in which you’ll get a bit further every time.

The fastest start is the Space Pod. The scenario starts just as any other survival scenario where you are expected to gather resources and build your own ships. Starting in a Drop Pod on a planet/moon is possible but may take you longer — on the other hand, there is no time limit to start the main event.

Should I play it?

There is no handholding and no mission steps for beginners. Since this scenario asks you to build and maintain a defence system, it is recommended for intermediate to advanced players who have experience with building and flying, know the available weapons and tools, know drone behaviour, know how not to waste ammo and fuel, know their way around debris fields, and so on.

Description (No spoilers)

The challenge is to defend a Beacon from the SPRT Space Pirates as long as possible.

You have unlimited time to prepare your defences in any way you see fit. The game will display messages to rush you to meet the attackers at the marker, but they won’t actively come for you.

The objective is to protect the “Space Base”, a small pre-built asteroid base with a beacon that is marked on your HUD. Be prepared to bring everything you need there.

What kind of defences you prepare is up to you. When you are ready, approach the green Space Base HUD marker closer than 100 metres to trigger the event. This trigger condition also implies that you cannot build your defences directly on the Space Base, because your approach would start the attack prematurely.

As usual in survival games, apart from mining, you get materials by capturing passing NPC ships and by salvaging derelict wrecks in space. In the World Settings, these are called Cargo Ships and Random Encounters.

Waves (Spoilers start here)

After you reach the location, the game will display messages about expected incoming waves and how many minutes away they are. Between the waves of attacks, you can attempt to add defences to the station and repair it and your fleet, or salvage dropped ammo etc. from the accumulating debris field.

A new wave starts only minutes after the previous one has been destroyed. It can happen that some disabled drones count as still alive and prolong the start of the next wave. The Space Base has a button that speeds up the arrival of the next wave of attacks.

Winning and Losing Conditions

New waves of attackers generate endlessly, until your beacon block is destroyed, which counts as the players losing.

Winning means for the player to obtain the achievements of surviving 10, 30 and 100 waves as well as destroying 1000 SPRT Drones. There is no main enemy base or end boss to defeat.

Ideas and more spoilers

The base comes with a survival kit, small amounts of resources, O2/H2 Generator, a small miner and a small fighter. The provided equipment is in need of repair and re-stocking.

You can design purpose-built ships and custom turrets right in the Survival Mode game (or experiment in a separate Creative Mode save) or find them in the Workshop. Then use projectors to build them in Survival Mode in the scenario and transport them to the Space Base.

You can set up point-defence guns and decoys on neighbouring asteroids, build armored ships that provide cover for the beacon, set up your own army of patrolling AI drones, have your multiplayer faction members steer fighters and battlecruisers, etc.

Consider that setting up everything takes time, so automate as much as possible. You will need to manage your time well before the next wave starts.

Cheaty Solutions

To install mods or change settings, first create, run, and join the scenario as usual, then save and quit. On the main screen, click Load Game, open the Never Surrender directory, and click Edit Game to get to the World Settings screen.

Slightly cheaty solutions include:

  • Disable Progression.
  • Change speed and efficiency World Settings (for refining, assembling, welding, grinding) in your favour.
  • Enable Economy in the World Settings, trade for a Zone Chip, and then build a Safe Zone around the beacon.
  • Grind down the blocks surrounding the beacon and move them onto a ship using Merge Blocks and fly it away…
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