Grav is a multiplayer sci-fi survival/crafting rpg.

Key Features:

• You level similar to an rpg with experience from killing monsters and stats to define your character.
  
• Crafting is done by building crafting stations and using blueprints dropped by monsters. Collecting blueprints is a crucial aspect of the game
  
• Base building is by construction various modules so not a lot of customization. You can then add things like power generators, force fields, shields, gun turrets, farms etc to your base
  
• Resources are gathered from the typical nodes: ore clumps, trees, gem shards using your gatherer tool
  
• Higher level items require resources from the above nodes in higher level areas
  
• Enemies have levels and different types of attacks. Big named ones spawn that are much harder but tend to drop blueprints. Currently they just spawn and then wander back and forth until agro'd
  
• Dungeons are scattered around which are so far long cave systems that get progressively higher level. Tend to have a lot of enemies, lots of named ones, and occasional clusters of resources.
  
• Friendly npcs currently wander around but don't offer anything at the moment except 'pet' blueprints.
  
• 'pets' are basically just temporary buffs you can spend resources to pull up
  
• You can run your own server, play on other users servers or play on the official ones. It is a multiplayer game but not a massively multiplayer one.

Similar Games:

• Rust (but can be played solo or pve only)
  
• Planet Explorers (but faster, more action based)
  
• Starforge (way faster development, better crafting/rpg system, build your base out of modules)
  
• .. and many others. lets face it this genre has been flooded recently. But..

Grav has been in short development and already has quite a lot to offer where others flounder

Very basic, hit esc to go to the menu and from there pull up the key chart.

Movement : WASD with mouse look. Space for jump. Shift for sprint (uses stamina)

Combat : Left mouse to fire/swing your weapon. Right mouse with a gun will aim it and right again to drop aim. Right mouse with a melee weapon will go into a series of power swings that do much more damage but use up your stamina. Use your hotbars to switch items.

Stims : You can put on your hotbar or use the defaults. H = use health stim. Using a health stim takes a second in combat but you can still move.

Console ~ : Hit ~ to pull up the console or hide it

Global Chat: Enter .
Team Chat: Y (teams are currently set using FOF codes)

Inventory: I
scrolling inventory screens are navigated by clicking and dragging up and down. You can click on an item for a basic description, to use (wear) or drop it. Dropping does not seem to work.
For weapons, vehicles or consumables you can hit the hotbar button to assign it a hotbar slot

You joined a server and are standing somewhere with nothing but a knife and basic multitool. Now what?

There are a few essentials you need to focus on right away before you can really decide what you want to do. If you are in a high level area, run around avoiding any enemies until you get in an area where they are closer to level 1. Find somewhere with trees nearby, some fossils and ore as well will help you build what you need.

What happens WHEN you die
You will respawn at Uplink you bound to with very little. You drop most of your items when you die except for essentials like blueprints, locaters, flare guns and starter items. You can then run to your corpse to pick up everything you dropped. Your corpse will be locked for a while after which anyone else can pick it up instead.

Originally posted by RyudoDragoon:

Upon dying, players drop a percentage of their inventory (≈80%). If you have more than 1 of something, you can't lose all of it. If you value an item, make sure to make two!

Your First Items
Your first items you need to craft is a Rotten Wooden Club, and a Locater. The club is because your knife does next to 0 damage and a level 1 monster will kill you while you tickle it. The locater will make your latitude and longitude show up along with location of your last death if you die. There is NO map You will need to use the lat,lon coordinates shown by your locater to get around and remember where stuff is.

To craft these it is easiest to find another players Science Lab, Factory and Armory so you don't have to waste resources building them yourself, but if you need to, go ahead and build all three.

Armory : build your weapons, ammo, armor and flare gun. Rotten wooden club should be your first pick and will last you several levels.

Factory : Used to build ingredients and vehicles. You will need to upgrade it as your recipes get more advanced

Science Lab: Build your locater here as well as 'stims' (potions). Once you can build health stims they will help you take down the bigger named guys that drop blueprints.

Once you have a club you can start killing low level creatures and get a little higher. Then you can get some rotten wooden armor to help you a bit much. The armor sucks but can help you get to the next tier of items.

Two important mechanics in Grav to keep in mind:

Most activities (fighting and harvesting) use up your Stamina and will stop when you run out

Stamina regenerates while you are not doing anything to use it but can also be restored by eating Rations. Rations and Large Rations can be crafted in the Kitchenette and require Organics, a resource dropped by various creatures or farmed in a Composter building.

Dancing heals you (the more the merrier)



The passive healing rate is very slow but as long as you have food you will continue to regen a bit by bit. To speed it up, build a campfire, ignite it, then hit X to dance. If you have other players dancing with you it heals very fast. NPCs will also come and have a rave at your campfire

Health stims for the impatient

Once you get the blueprint for health stims (it is low level), you can build them in a science station. You'll want to always have several in hand. It's an instant health boost with a cooldown and lets you tackle harder monsters or just keep going without having to wait on the slow passive regen.

Medical Bot

One of the pets you can build will provide you a constant source of health regen while you have it out.

Gathering resources is done same as other similar games. Use your Multi-tool on a resource node for a while until it pops.

Basic Resources:

• Ore
  
• Gems
  
• Fossils
  
• Wood (cut down trees)

Ore, Gems and Fossils are all found in much greater quantities insides dungeons

Planet Specific Resources:

• Plasma - found on moons
  
• Sunstone - found on desert planets
  
• Tundrite - arctic planets
  
• Magmanite - fire planets

Special Resources
There are special resources that each node can provide as well depending on the level of the area. For example: a plank of wood can be built using 10 wood in a factory. You can also get a plank of wood directly instead of just 1 wood while gathering. Higher level areas you might get a Hardened Plank of Wood. Or Colored Gems while harvesting gems. In this way you can't really just sit and harvest a low level area in order to build higher level blueprints.You can use the Factory however to craft some higher level ingredients from lower ones.

Element X
Element X is unlike the others in that you need to build a harvester on top of the resource node, and then occasionally go back to check on it. It is a dropped blueprint but pretty low level and once you have it you can build it using B. The resource node looks like dust or something burrowing beneath the dirt. You must put the harvester directly on top of the node and then it will run automatically while it still has Element X to harvest. When it runs out it will turn red and sit idle and you can either destroy it or leave and build another where the element has shown up. While it harvests it will collect the element and you must go to it and retrieve it.




Element X is currently used to buy pet schemetics, level up certain character perks (health, runspeed, number of pets at a time), and in a few blueprints


Enemy Body Parts

Blueprints for various weapons will require body parts of enemies in a similar level range. For example, Slime Spines occasionaly drop from slimes level 9-16, while there are also slime tongues, slime sacs etc from slimes in different level ranges. To build an Ore Sword, you need Slime Spines, but to build a combat pistol you need sacs.

Matter Compressor

This base item lets you combine lower level enemy drops to create higher level ones. Usually it takes 4 or 5 of the lower item + some other resources + stem cells (another drop item) to craft one of the higher item. Upgrading lets you craft higher level parts.

You can either build a base for the fun of it, or just build the few essentials for crafting and to store your gear.

• Make sure you are near areas with trees, ore, gems and element X. They don't have to be in front of you but in easy reach
  
• Base structures are EXPENSIVE. And not needed. If you just want something functional you don't need to build a castle, just a room. If you do want to build a castle, you'll need a ton of wood and fossils
  
• To keep stuff powered requires a constant stream of wood. Your generator runs out of wood, your base will no longer be protected. Upgrade your generator to make it more efficient and hold more Wood so you don't have to keep refilling it as often.
  
• You don't need to move your base to level. You'll be able to build vehicles later to quickly go from your base to a higher level gathering or monster slaying spot. You'll soon build teleporter rooms to link bases and stargates to travel from your base. You may end up building small outposts so you can replenish your health and ammo though.
  
• The Engineer Job skills and Constructorbot pets will make building rooms and base items much, much cheaper. Try leveling those up before you begin any large bases.

Available Buildings
This list is in progress as the game is constantly changing and I myself just started. Most of these require blueprints to drop


Uplink
cheap and lets you respawn there when you die.


Factory
build crafting materials and vehicles

Science Station
stims, locater, eventually more

Armory
weapons, armor, ammo

Campfire
consumes wood. starts dance party. attracts npcs. heals you (if you dance)

Matter Condenser
Can craft various body parts and crafting ingredients by providing lower level ingredients and stem cells

Composter
small cheap building. Consumes wood to grow plants you can then take as Organics.


Generator
provides power to any components near it that near it. Consumes wood to run. Upgrading increases how much wood it can store. Note: you don't need to do anything to connect the power, just have stuff nearby.

Force Field
Put it in your door and turn it on to block anyone from passing through.


Power Relay
Extends the reach of your generator. Can chain them in a row to let one generator provide power over a larger area.

Beacon
shines a giant light in the sky broadcasting your location to everyone nearby

Shield Generator
Changed from shield nexus. It protects all rooms and base items within a certain area. Can overlay multiple to protect larger areas. Other players cannot build within it and your rooms do not take damage from them. Rooms that are protected have a shimmering effect appear over their texture.

Bubble Shield
Added to patch 17. Generates a bubble like the old shield nexus. Inside the bubble it protects against projectiles and removes Environmental hazards. The bubble has large but limited health.

Automated Gun Turrets
When active will shoot anyone in front of it, other players and npcs includes. Players must be in your FOF to not get shot. Consumes ore while firing. Does decent damage but flimsy

Laser fence
create two or more fence nodes and it will connect them with a laser that kills or does a ton of damage to any hostile that passes through it. Each fence node has to be in range of power and can be destroyed if targetted. Upgrading has it create more lasers between nodes.


Moon Stargate
Travel to a nearby moon. Which moon is available can change depending on their orbit.

Planet Stargates
Travel to an exo-planet that is within range. There are several types of planets and they go in and out of range depending on their orbits. Stargates come in three version: low, mid and high referring to the level range of the planets they connect to.

Artifact Decryptor
Used to provide access to the worlds artifacts. *need more info on how these work*

Base storage bin
store items. Others in your fof (team) can put or take stuff as well. Currently the only way to trade

Area Totem
claims a zone for yourself. As of patch 17, all harvesting done within this zone gets taxed and the tax gets deposited into the totem itself for you to collect



Flag

Arrow sign

*currently being written

Your basic harvest everything tool. Equip it and shoot it at a resource node (tree,ore etc) to harvest that resource until it pops. Right click and target a base item or room in order to spend resources to repair it. Upgrading it increases speed and how much of each resource you get per 'tick'.

• Mark I
  
  image

  Crafting

  • Automatically given to all characters
• Mark II
  
  image

  Crafting

  • Spherical Cube x5
• Mark III
  
  image

  Crafting

  • TODO
• Mark IV
  
  image

  Crafting

  • TODO
• Mark V
  
  image

  Crafting

  • TODO
• Mark VI
  
  image

  Crafting

  • TODO
• Mark VII
  
  image

  Crafting

  • TODO
• Mark VIII
  
  image

  Crafting

  • TODO
• Mark IX
  
  image

  Crafting

  • TODO
• Mark X
  
  image

  Crafting

  • TODO
• Mark XI
  
  image

  Crafting

  • TODO

Once you build it you always have it. Press F to fire a flare that other players can see to go to your location

Once you build it you always have it. Displays your coordinates in the top right, along with the last cave you visited and the last place you died. Currently there is no map or compass so this is the only way to track locations

Weapons can have elemental damage attached to them as part of the blueprint. Named monsters with that element tend to drop corresponding blueprints

Guns require ammo that is crafted in the armory for ore, and also dropped. The early guns are quite weak but higher levels guns can do very good damage, especially if combined with the damage pets (which only affect guns not melee).



Knife (starting item)
Rotten Wooden Club : first to build, decent damage for early levels


Wooden Sword : slight upgrade to the club


Ore Sword :


Ore Sword+:


Gem Sword


Gem Sword+


Plasma Sword
*currently missing images and crafting details for this. Requires plasma from the moon

Plasma Sword+

SunStone Swords
*3 different types of swords that use Sunstone. Need more information

Tundrite Swords[/]
*3 different types of swords that use Tundrite. Need more information

Moon

ElementX sword

Damage

136-155

Enriched Fossil

6

Enriched Plank

6

Pristine Bark

14

Slime - lvl7

14

ElementX+ sword

Damage

149-170

Infused Fossil

3

Infused Plank

3

Lightning Struck Bark

16

Slime - lvl8

16

Artifact Sword

Damage

164-188

Infused Fossil

4

Infused Plank

4

Decayed Heartwood

18

Slime - lvl9

18

Artifact+ Sword

Damage

181-206

Irradiated Fossil

2

Irradiated Plank

2

Pristine Heartwood

20

Slime - lvl10

20

Pistols

. Ammo costs 2 ore per clip. Decent range. Fairly rapid fire. smaller clips. Requires night killer parts to craft.

• Rusty pistol : start with the blueprint but it sucks, skip it
  
• Combat pistol : slightly better but still uses a lot of ammo for little damage
  
• Combat Pistol+ : bit better but not great
  
• Space Ranger Pistol
  
• Space Marine Pistol
  
• Pistol - lvl 5
  
• Pistol - lvl 6 (seems to be placeholder name)
  
• Pistol - lvl7
  
• Pistol - lvl8
  
• Pistol - lvl9
  
• Pistol - lvl10

Assault Rifles.

Ammo costs 3 ore/clip. Large clip, rapid fire, decent range. Uses daykiller parts to craft

• AR-200 : first rifle blueprint. Good for softening up named npcs before meleeing but destroys ammo and ore to make said ammo
  
• AR-1000 : needs around lvl10+ ingredients to craft
  
• AR-Flashpoint : lvl 17+ ingredients to craft
  
• AR-Retribution
  
• AR-Wrath
  
• Ar lvl 5
  
• Ar lvl 6
  
• Ar lvl 7
  
• Ar lvl 8
  
• Ar lvl 9
  
• Ar lvl 10

Shotguns.

Does more much damage at very close range. Ammo is 4 ore/clip. Requires technohunter parts to craft

• SG BoomBoom Jr : Similar lvl to AR-1000. Around lvl 10+
  
• SG BoomBoom Sr
  
• SG XVIX
  
• SG Pulper
  
• Shotgun lvl5 - (ingredients show it to be lvl9)
  
• Shotgun lvl6
  
• Shotgun lvl7
  
• Shotgun lvl8
  
• Shotgun lvl9
  
• Shotgun lvl10

SMG

A fast short range weapon. All SMG recipes and the ammo require Sunstone from a Desert planet

• SMG-V1 : An SMG
  
• SMGPK: A Rusty SMG
  
• SMGPK2
  
• SMG 1000: An enhanced SMG
  
• SMG Turbo
  
• SMG Turbo v2
  
• SMG Turbo v3
  
• SMG Turbo v4

Traps

• Landmine : explodes when an enemy passes over it and does a lot of damage. It WILL hurt friendly players as well at the moment so be careful
  
• Landmine Stunner : same as above but stuns instead of high damage

Armor sets are divided into tiers which each piece of armor dropping as a blueprint.

Elements: Every armor piece can come with an element attached. If you have the majority of armor pieces with a specific element on, you take and avoid damage according to the element chart below just like enemies do.

Hazards: Most planet specific armor types will protects you against the Environmental Hazards on that planet but may make you weak against others. To explore various planets you will thus need to make several sets of armor.

*todo: I need screenshots of each complete set








Strong against Radiation


Requires plasma from moons
Strong against Low Oxygen

Requires sunstone from desert planets
Strong against Heat. Weak against Cold

Strong against Cold. Weak against Heat



Requires magmanite from Fire planets
Strong against Heat. Weak against cold

There are two basic types of vehicles available: the monocycle and jetpack. Each has an improved + version that is faster and reduces their fuel costs.

You cannot use weapons or items while on a vehicle. You CAN place buildings which makes the jetpack especially essential for some types of construction projects.

There is now a short loading animation when equipping either one that forces you to remain still while loading the vehicle. This means don't jump when loading the jetpack! This was introduced to help pvp balance.

A fast land vehicles




Let's you fly around. Required to get to different islands on your starter planet and reach some valuable spots like the floating islands or top of the domes where loot boxes tend to spawn

The Wingsuit is a pair of wings strapped to your back that will deploy when you hold jump (space), while it is not a "mount" as such, it does enable users to glide.

These are cheap to make and do not require fuel but do need stamina to deploy.

Activating an item is impossible while gliding.

By default all other players show up as 'unfriendly' and are treated as hostile by your base defenses ( laser fences and gun turrets)

Teams are currently implemented by using 'FoF' codes. Anyone that is set to the same FoF number as you is on your team

To Join A Team
decide on a number for your FoF code, then open the console (~) and type
clientsetplayerfofcode <your fof code>

There is no current way to limit your team or set invitations only

Team Benefits

• Other players show up as friendly and you won't hurt each other when fighting together
  
• You can use team chat instead of global (press y)
  
• Base defenses don't attack you
  
• Any buildings set to FoF can be used by other team members
  
• All items in storage chests are shared. Which also makes this the only way to currently trade with other players
  
• Nexus Shields prevent base damage from unfriendly players

I don't know if xp and loot are shared with other fof members or just any other players in the area

Currently each world appears to consist of 2-3 Islands. To cross the water you can use a jetpack provided you have enough wood. If you fall in the ocean, you die with no way to get back the resources you dropped.

*NOTE* There is a current bug where if you go too far out in the ocean, you fall of the world and lose everything. I learned this the hard way. be careful on your voyage.

The starter island
Appears to be made up of lvl 1 - 12 zones and where every player starts. I saw only one dome.

The next island is lvl 14-29/30ish. I saw domes on every corner, a tower in the middle and a couple floating islands. There are many more loot crates and the domes have a World Artifact inside each one.





Some servers might have the same zones spread among 3 islands instead of 2 depending on the random gen. Regardless the starter world goes to the highest lvl of 30 (or 32/33 inside a dungeon).

The domes are science labs that appear to point to the nightkillers and daykillers having been experiments gone wrong:

By hitting 'K' you can bring up your player jobs and pets menu

Player Jobs

Jobs are somewhat like classes in other rpgs with a few noticeable differences:

• You can collect all of them and switch between what is your active job at any time.
  
• Your active job determines your current level when in combat, however the benefits from leveling your inactive job skills are always present.
  
• All jobs aside from Astronaut (that you start with), are random drops
  
• Your rank that shows up in chat is the accumalation of your level in each job
  
  NOTE:
  *I am missing many skills and info about other jobs*
  *I do not know how much each upgrade improves the relevant stat. If anyone knows please comment*
  
  
  Astronaut
  • Runspeed
    
  • Health
    
  • Health Recover : how much health items (like stims) return to you
    
  • Bandolier Size : Increases how much ammo you can carry. Adds about 10 shotgun shells per level
    
  • Pet Control : probably the most useful at the momet, allows you to have multiple pets out and their buffs stack
    
  • Pet Duration : increases the duration that your pets stay active
  
  
  Engineer
  Skills make building and crafting cheaper, bridges longer, pets cheaper, and shotguns better
  
  
  
  Acrobat
  
  
  Scientist
  
  Pets
  
  Pets are little drones that fly around you and grant a buff while active. They cost a bit of resources to summon and last 10 minutes. You start off able to have one at a time but can increase with the Pet Control player skill. You must first buy the blueprint off any of the wandering npcs for each type of pet
  
  
  • Damage : specifically *ranged* damage. 25% increase.
    
  • Runspeed
    
  • Light : the drone orbits you with a directional flashlight.
    
  • Harvest speed : I believe 25% harvest speed increase
    
  • Medibot : provides a constant source of health regen
    
  • Construbot: reduces the cost of base rooms while active
  
  Currently increasing pet control and then stacking damage pets with a shotgun or harvest pets while deforestating the world to build your base seems to be most effective use of these

Every enemy, weapon and armor in the game can have an element attached to it that changes it damage type. Picking the right element to use against an enemy will let you do far more damage. It appears to be more than 2x the damage if they are vulnerable, and about 1/2 the normal damage if they are resistant. Higher levels of the same element will have different prefixes ( chilling, arctic, scorching, inferno etc)

These is a more in depth guide to the elements here: http://cs2bus.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=374584591



Ice

• Vulnerable To: Fire, Playersoul
  
• Effective Against : Poison
  
• Description variations : chilling, arctic, frozen

Fire

• Vulnerable To: Playersoul
  
• Effective Against : Ice
  
• Description variations : combustible, scorching, inferno

Electric

• Vulnerable To: Poison
  
• Effective Against : Playersoul
  
• Description variations : sparkling, shocking

Poison

• Vulnerable To: Ice, Playersoul
  
• Effective Against : Electric
  
• Description variations : infected, toxic

Moonlight (can be obtained and crafted on the moons)

• Vulnerable To: Fire, Ice, Playersoul
  
• Effective Against : Electric, Poison
  
• Description variations : Luminous, Dazzling, Brilliant, Blinding

* I don't know what playersoul is, it's not available without admin commands
* There is a variation of 'tough' (brute, intimidating etc) that is resistant to all elements

Currently there is no true single player, all GRAV games need a server to connect to. However you can either pick one of the official GRAV servers, connect to a private server or run your own.

For a more detailed look at the steps, check out How to Run A Dedicated Server[grav.gamepedia.com]

Create the Server

1. Create a text document at (Steam install ocation)\steamapps\common\GRAV\Binaries\Win32
   
2. Paste the following:
   
   CAGGameServer-Win32-Shipping cag_p?steamsockets?Port=7785?PeerPort=7786?QueryPort=27019?MaxPlayers=64?ServerName="My GRAV Dedicated Server" -seekfreeloadingserver
3. Modify the MaxPlayers and ServerName as you want
   
4. PVE (optional) : add ?allowpvp=0 to the string
   
5. Password (optional) : add ?gamepassword=YOUR_PASSWORD to the string
   
6. Admin Password (optional) : add ?AdminPassword=ADMIN_PASSWORD to the string
   
7. Save file as a .bat . ie.. start.bat, myserver.bat . If using notepad you will need to change "Save as Type" to "All Files" to avoid having it automatically save as .txt
   
8. Create Shortcut (optional) right click on the file and then select "Send To" > "Desktop (create shortcut)"
   
9. Double click on the file or shortcut to start your server

Connect to the Server

1. Start Grav
   
2. In the server browser open console by hitting TAB
   
3. Type open 127.0.0.1:7785 . If you changed the default port or are running it on another computer you'll need to change the ip:port to match
   
4. The dedicated server window should now show you are connecting and it will load a while after (the first load is always slow)

Make your Server Public

1. Get you public IP at https://www.google.com/#hl=en&q=what+is+my+ip
   
2. Set your router to Port Forward the game port (default 7785). If you don't know how to do this you'll need to refer to your routers management panel or help file
   
3. Share your public IP and port with your friends. When they are at the server list they can then hit TAB and type open YOUR_IP:YOUR_PORT to connect