So why did the Steam Engine stay the same as in Early Access?

[Unfawkable]

It has a whopping 2000 Steel price for a range of 10, burden 15, power 27. Did they just forget to balance it out, or am I missing some niche use for it?

[babba]

I find it good how it is, its for the casual gamers...Of course any item could be two, four or ten fold as expensive to make. One likes is so, the other so - Klei tries to find a Mario balance.

...Gaming

[MiniDeathStar]

I agree, which is why I've made a mod to allow players to tune it however they see fit. Shameless plug.

[Coolthulhu]

I made some good use of it trying out a 1 asteroid "challenge", with a rad ocean start, so no petroleum, reed or plastic. All I had was CO2 and steam.

Outside of similarly constrained builds, it doesn't look useful. It's expensive early on, slow, painful to recharge. Its low fuel cost doesn't matter because CO2 is cheaper and CO2+petroleum fill almost all the niches steam would, but better.

I heard that it's useful for data bank grinding trips because of its high power production and slow speed.

[DolphinWing]

Steam engine has 25 height and 600W power during flight. It is better than small petro (20 height/240W) and rad engine (20 height/0W) rockets. Although it is slow, it does have some advantages in some environments.

Last time I used it as a round trip rockets to send resources as a pre-supply mission without landing. At that time I don't have enough height on my small petro rocket but enough steel. More important, I don't want to build another spacefarer and fill another oxygen tank. So I use rocket exhaust heat to make enough steam for engine swap.

[babba]

Shame on me, I meant the Steam Turbine I always mix up the Steam Engine with the Turbine ! Excuse: Its Monday

Best is, this is the Turbine in my head...

Wind Tunnel = Turbine in babba world

[WhiteWind36]

I found steam engine like one of the best. I would rather skip carbon and sugar straight to steam, and from steam jump straight to hydrogen engine, skipping small petroleum, petroleum and probably radbolt engine. There is 2 simple reasons for that: one is power generation on flight, and another is rocket height limit.

While I could imagine that in some cases it could be useful to have radbolt rocket, only because of it's speed and easy fuel.

What would be useful indeed is petroleum engines using ethanol. Then I would consider them as an option.

[goboking]

I like the steam engine, but its building costs are a bit steep.

[WhiteWind36]

2 hours ago, goboking said:

I like the steam engine, but its building costs are a bit steep.

Especially if considering there is no gold amalgam available and most likely then you have to use steel for aquatuner and for gas pump. So for launching steam rocket you need 3250 kg of steel... Is this price too big? Maybe... Is it worth that steel - sure 100%

After release I started new colony. Builded carbon engine rocket... Looked at it... And decided that I need to build steam engine, to have a decent start... It's just so small and there is so little of what you can build on carbon engine rocket, that I would need building and simultaneously launching two carbon rockets to accomplish what is easy doable with one steam rocket. That saves me 900 refined metal for rocket platform and lot's of time for building rocket interior.

[Gurgel]

Just used to scout and colonize the inner moonlets with a steam engine. Not really useful beyond that due to limited range. You can build refueling stations easily though, but I went for radbolt as 2nd engine instead.

[Simonova]

2 minutes ago, Gurgel said:

Just used to scout and colonize the inner moonlets with a steam engine. Not really useful beyond that due to limited range. You can build refueling stations easily though, but I went for radbolt as 2nd engine instead.

Exactly this; the steam engine is ideal for making a commuter rocket around the moonlet cluster. Save the late game rockets for the outer asteroids.

I have my steam rocket pilot gathering space data as they go, to get some value out of the free power and long trips (sometimes, I disable the command console to make the trips longer just to get more research).

[Unfawkable]

Huh. Alright, the height and the power generation combined with the fact that I can use it to heat delete when generating Steam for it may make it worthwhile. I'll give it a shot before going to Petros.

[WhiteWind36]

5 hours ago, Unfawkable said:

Huh. Alright, the height and the power generation combined with the fact that I can use it to heat delete when generating Steam for it may make it worthwhile. I'll give it a shot before going to Petros.

Also if you wish you can multiply heat and probably even water if you build a long enough tunel for rocket. You can pump 110 c° steam to engine and it will produce steam ~200 c°.

Also you can build lots of batteries on rocket and decharge them when landed, 'cause you will never use up all energy produced while in flight. I had 7 batteries on rocket, and after flying 4 tiles with electrolyzer, data Bank production, air pump and light on, the rocket was always landing with full battery.