So, I started the game, fumblingly figured out how to make mines, construction yards and the like, and now I have no idea what to do, and the tutorial dosen't help that much.
From a viewpoint of pure mechanics only - at some point you'll probably want to make ships, because if you don't explore then you will eventually run out of minerals to build stuff.
Of course 'make ships' is the shorthand for...
- Design your ship systems in the design page (located somewhere along the bottom of the Research screen)
- Research the ship system you've just designed (assign it as a research project to one of your lead scientists)
- Once you have (at least) engines designed, go into the Ship Design screen
- Add components to your ship (if you have no engines you tend not to move quickly, or indeed at all)
- Retool a shipyard to the plans for your ship
- Set it to build one (or more if desired) of your new design
- Wait 0.6-1.5 years for it to finish construction
Some good first ships are:
- a geological survey vessel (allows you to survey for mineral deposits) - just add 2 (vary to taste) Geological Survey Sensors and Engines to desired speed on top of the basic 'new ship' framework - once it's built, you can assign it to a Taskgroup and set it up with the 'special order' to 'Survey Nearest Body' / 'Survey Next 5 Bodies', and it'll do its thing. (You may also want to set a conditional refuel order)
- a cargo freighter - add 5 Cargo Bays, probably about 5-7 Engines, 1-2 Cargo Handling Systems and you'll probably need an extra Crew Quarters as well (it'll tell you in the design if you lack life support for crew). If you have a valid 'commercial freighter' design, civilian shipping lines will build them as well (even if you don't!), which is important for a couple of reasons.
You may also at some point need:
- a civilian transporter/colony ship - As 'cargo freighter' above but with Cryogenic Storage Bays instead of Cargo Bays. Civilian shipping companies will build these too if you design them, so you never (normally) have to worry about moving colonists manually (unless you want to)
- a gravitational survey ship - As 'geological survey' above,
except that these are always classed as Military vessels, and so are subject to Maintenance if you have that option set in the game options. These will survey the area around the system to find Jump Points which will allow you to explore new systems.
- some sort of warships - there is, in fact, life outside our solar system, and most of it is armed to the tooth-analogues with missiles and lasers and stuff. You can try a peaceful approach and attempt communication and diplomacy, but first contact usually involves communication via missile, so it's a good idea to at least have some sort of missile defence setup on your ships as well as a good few layers of armour.
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From the viewpoint of non-mechanics based - Aurora doesn't have a 'win condition', so you may find yourself encountering various levels of DF-style fun on your journey - how you play the game from there is up to you. You could try achieving peace with all alien empires through diplomacy and tactful communication, or you could achieve peace with all alien empires through annihilating their ships, bombing their colonies from orbit and using a terraformer fleet to pump sulphur dioxide into their homeworld's atmosphere. Plus there's a few spoiler-based encounters too along the lines of DF's HFS, which can mix things up a bit.