Plasma Turrets and Filters Guide

If you’re trying to keep Dark Fog space attacks under control while also pushing your mid- and late-game production forward, Plasma Turrets and Plane Filters are two parts of the same problem: defense and the material chain that supports advanced tech. The trick is to unlock the right links first, size the upstream chain correctly, and place your turrets in a way that protects you without accidentally starting a fight you are not ready for. Build the production line with the Gravity Matrix chain in mind, then put your space defense in place once ammo and power can support it.

Unlock the production chain you need before you start mass-building

Do not treat Plane Filters as a standalone item to spam just because you can make them. Titanium Glass has only one practical use: making Plane Filters. Plane Filters are only used to make Quantum Chips, and Quantum Chips are a direct component of the Gravity Matrix. That means Titanium Glass sits one step upstream from science production, not as a side project.

The same planning applies to your buildings. Chemical Plant is the midgame production building you will lean on for advanced chemical materials like Plastic, Organic Crystal, Sulfuric Acid, Graphene, and Carbon Nanotube. If you are preparing for midgame expansion, reserve Chemical Plant space early, because this same building class underpins the broader industrial chain you will keep needing later.

Here is the useful reference to keep in mind as you plan the chain:

Set up Titanium Glass with enough inputs and enough space

Titanium Glass needs glass, Titanium ingots, and water at the same time. That triple-input requirement is the real obstacle, not the crafting step itself. A single planet with practical deposits of all three is uncommon; Glacieon is the usable example worth remembering, but even there the supply is not especially abundant. For anything beyond a small local setup, assume you will need interstellar transport for at least one input.

Your first goal should be stability, not scale. Build the input logistics first, then expand the Titanium Glass line only after all three feeds are steady. Do not force a huge local setup on a planet that is missing one of the ingredients, because the bottleneck will simply move upstream and stall everything else.

Use the ratios to size the rest of the chain instead of guessing. Five Assembling Machines producing Titanium Glass supply enough material for twelve Assembling Machines producing Plane Filters, a 12:5 ratio. The same five Assembling Machines also supply enough for three Assembling Machines producing Quantum Chips, a 3:5 ratio. That means Titanium Glass should be treated as a shared resource if you are feeding both science and defense growth.

In practice, this is the point where many factories get messy: they build too many Plane Filter assemblers and then wonder why the line starves. Start from Titanium Glass output, then grow the Plane Filter line to match it. If you want the chain to stay reliable, keep your Titanium Glass plant ahead of demand instead of letting it play catch-up.

Keep your Chemical Plants laid out like an industrial row, not a compact assembler block

Chemical Plant is not a building you want to tuck into a tight cluster. It processes Refined Oil into advanced materials and can also refine Fire Ice, but it behaves like a large stretched industrial processor rather than a normal Assembler. Its footprint is 7×4, and Sorters can only be attached along its wide, long side. That layout alone should tell you to plan for long rows, not dense squares.

The best way to place Chemical Plants is in straight lines, especially for equatorial factory lines where space and logistics are easier to standardize. Because many Chemical Plant recipes have relatively long crafting times, compact placement does not buy you much anyway. What matters is clean routing and room to expand later.

Leave more space than you think you need. Chemical Plant output feeds Plastic, Organic Crystal, Sulfuric Acid, Graphene, and Carbon Nanotube, and even when you have alternative sources later, the building remains valuable as a backup and as a way to keep a factory self-contained. If you know your planet will need heavy chemical production, reserve the row now rather than tearing up a finished layout later.

Solve the Plane Filter bottleneck by scaling the upstream chain first

When Plane Filters slow down, do not reflexively add more Plane Filter assemblers. Plane Filters depend on Titanium Glass and Casimir Crystals, and the Titanium Glass line is commonly the limiting step because it combines multiple inputs at once. If the filters are stalling, the upstream chain is almost always the real problem.

The correct move is to expand Titanium Glass production first and keep its inputs flowing smoothly. Five Assembling Machines making Titanium Glass can support twelve Plane Filter assemblers, so any serious Plane Filter line needs a healthy Titanium Glass backbone. Because Plane Filters are a narrow-use item, overbuilding them is not very helpful; steady feed matters far more than raw machine count.

Use that principle whenever you scale the Gravity Matrix chain. If Titanium Glass delivery is uneven, extra Plane Filter machines will just sit idle and make your factory look busier than it is. Balance the whole chain, and let the upstream line dictate how far the downstream line should grow.

Bring Plasma Turrets online as your space-defense backbone

Plasma Turret is the weapon you want when the Dark Fog threat in upper air and space becomes serious. It is the only turret besides the Missile Turret that can attack Upper Air and Space targets, but it does so with far greater punch. It is not a general-purpose wall weapon, and you should not try to use it that way. It is a dedicated anti-space defense system.

The turret is expensive in power terms, with a 1.68 MW operating draw and 84.0 kW standby draw, but the trade-off is strength and reach. It has 800 hp, fires 1 shot/sec, defends out to 140 m, reaches 6500 m into space, and covers 0 to 80 degrees of elevation. Plasma Capsules deal 300 damage with an 8 m blast radius and come in stacks of 10, while Antimatter Capsules deal 1500 damage with a 20 m blast radius and come in stacks of 10.

Treat ammo as part of the build, not an afterthought. Plasma Capsules are simpler to produce than Gravity Missiles and perform with the same DPS, while Antimatter Capsules are your heavier option for tougher threats. If your supply line is shaky, fix that before you expect the turrets to save the planet.

Place them where they cover space attacks without provoking more than you can handle

By default, Plasma Turrets do not engage Upper Air targets. Keep it that way unless you deliberately want them to shoot Relay Stations. Turning on Upper Air targeting lets them attack Relay Stations, and that matters because Relay Stations provide matter to the Dark Fog Space Hive and power its Planetary Bases.

Use that setting carefully. Destroying Relay Stations before they land does not increase the Hive threat level, but attacking landed or otherwise active relay support greatly escalates the response. In other words, you can cut off a relay in transit safely, but you should not casually flip the switch and expect no consequences once the enemy is established.

For most planets, start with a small ring of Plasma Turrets near the north and south poles. That is an easy and relatively cheap way to cover space invasions. Once your power production is strong enough, add Planetary Shield Generators as the next layer of safety.

Also remember that Plasma Turrets only fire on space Dark Fog units when those units are marked red on the starmap, which happens when they are actively attacking Icarus or mobilizing for attack. That means a Space Hive can sit near your planet without triggering the guns. The danger is what happens when you launch from a nearby planet: if the Hive responds by attacking Icarus, your turrets may join the fight and provoke a much larger planetary invasion. If that is a possibility, make sure your shields are up and your ammo stockpile is already in place before you take off.