Environment Modification

Environment Modification is the terrain-editing system used to reshape a planet’s surface. It covers the use of Foundation to level ground, fill sea, and cut down mountains, along with options for restoring or burying veins and oil seeps and for applying concrete decoration to flattened land.

Foundation is used directly on the ground. Each tile consumes one Foundation, and filling in water also consumes Soil pile based on the volume being filled; deeper water uses more Soil pile. The placement size can be adjusted with +/- while placing, from a 1×1 grid up to 10×10. In addition to reclaiming ocean, it can remove mountains, but mountains are automatically leveled when a building is placed and also yield Soil pile, so manual terraforming is usually unnecessary unless you want a specific shape or decorative finish.

A key limitation is that once sea has been filled in, there is no way to restore it. This matters if you want to keep access to Water or Sulfuric Acid for pumping later, so overfilling should be avoided. Areas that have already been terraformed are stored internally as completed, and changing their mode later does not consume Foundation again. The same functions can also be used from the environment modification tab even if you are not currently holding Foundation.

The system also controls whether flattened ground is decorated with concrete. This has no gameplay effect, but it changes the appearance of the terrain. If decoration is enabled, placing Foundation covers the ground with concrete, and the color can be changed before placement. If decoration is disabled, the ground is only leveled and keeps its existing surface color, although grass, trees, and sea are still removed as part of terraforming.

Another mode lets you temporarily restore or bury Veins and Crude oil seep. Restoring mode leaves resource nodes unchanged, while burying mode can hide them beneath terrain if they are in the way of expansion. If a vein has been buried, clicking it again in restoring mode makes it reappear. This does not reduce the remaining amount of the deposit. Buried veins around underwater sites or Dark Fog Planetary Base locations can also be recovered by restoring the terrain there.

Soil pile is the special resource that makes large-scale terraforming practical. It is obtained by leveling land above sea level and is not stored in the inventory, nor is it limited by carry capacity. Large mountainous planets with wide construction areas are the best source when a lot of fill material is needed.