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How to Upgrade, Repair, and Recruit Crew in Starbound

In Starbound, your spaceship is the key to traveling from planet to planet. Your ship and pet differ depending on your starting race. As your ships usually provide a portable sanctuary for yourself and your crew, keeping your ship in tip-top shape is important. In this guide, you will learn how to Upgrade, Repair, and find a Crew for your ship.

Table of Contents

How to Repair Your Ship in Starbound

Core Fragments Starbound

Note: to spawn in unlimited Core Fragments, use the command /spawnitem corefragmentore 1000

There are two components to repairing your ship in Starbound. At the very beginning of the game, you must repair your ship’s thrusters and hull. After that, players must repair their ship’s engine.

What Do You Need to Repair Your Ship’s Hull and Thrusters?

In order to repair your ship’s thrusters and hull, you must obtain 1000 pixels and 20 core fragments.

  • Pixels can be obtained by slaying enemies.
  • Core fragments are bright orange ores and can be obtained by mining deep into the planet’s core.

Once you have got 1000 pixels and 20 core fragments, you must teleport back up to your ship. Once you have arrived at your ship, go to the S.A.I.L (The control panel). Once you have clicked on the control panel, a tab should open in your game; then, you must click “Repair Ship’s Thrusters”.

What Do You Need to Repair Your Ship’s Engine?

Afterward, go to the right of your ship and travel to the Outpost. To the Outpost’s right will be a shop, where players will find Penguin Pete. Here, you can see that you must collect Erchius Crystals in order to fix the ship’s engine. To collect Erchius Crystals, you will need to go to the Erchius Mining Facility.

To find the Erchius Mining Faciliy, go to S.A.I.L and press current missions. Here, click the Erchius Mining Facility option and when you click on it, you get teleported straight there from wherever you are.

Once you have beaten the facility, travel back to Penguin Pete and give him the crystals to fully repair your ship.

How to Upgrade Your Ship in Starbound

Upgrade Ship at Penguin Bay
Penguin Bay

Note: use the command /upgradeship to instantly upgrade your ship.

To upgrade your ship, you must go to the “Penguin Bay” shop located in the outpost (It can be found to the right of the outpost, and just to the left of a small crane, it should be tended by a purple guy in a hood). Once you arrive at Penguin Bay, you want to buy the fake license for 20000 pixels. Upon purchasing this license your ship will be permanently upgraded.

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How to Recruit Crew Members for your Ship

Recruit Crew Starbound

Recruiting crew members in Starbound, depending on the player’s luck, can be a relatively straight forward process; although sometimes repetitive and irritating to do. To begin, you must explore a given planet’s surface for settler outposts; once found, complete quests for the NPCs. You can tell when a settler has a quest available, as there is an exclamation mark above their head. If you complete enough of these quests, a settler will eventually ask you to join your crew.

When this happens, you can select the option to hire them and they will join your crew. Once hired, these NPCs will teleport to your ship, where they can be interacted with. They can also follow you as you explore the planet. To recruit more crew members, you will, unfortunately, have to repeat the above process over again, as they can’t be purchased on mass. While doing this, keep in mind that your ship has limited spots for crew members, so don’t hire bad crew members.

Can You Get Rid of Crew Members Starbound?

Yes; players have the option to get rid of their ship’s crew members in Starbound by selecting the dismiss option. To do this, start by going to the crew tab on your ship’s interface (S.A.I.L), located in the right of your ship. From there, click the “dismiss” button, which will remove the selected crewmate, freeing up a spot on your crew.

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