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Okey. I admit, various mistakes I made are present in the following story.

So, I found a crashed spaceship on the moon of Slipchant-8 Hainay, named Ouchimano. She is a hell of beauty, and I fell in love at the first glance. Her pulse engine is seriously damaged: nothing but 20 zinc could save her. I don't have any, hadn't ever since I landed on this moon. Love is blind, however, and I took the challenge of finding it - I thought there must be some trading post nearby where I can obtain. I couldn't have been more wrong. (I took this a bit as a role-playing and a challenge, and I ignored I could go back to my previous ship. Mistake...)

On my journey searching for the desired material, I made a huge mistake. I called Ouchimano to an outpost. I still can't believe she made it there, with all her deep wounds, but there she was; and while I was glad to see her, I had to realize I have lost my only indicator to my previous ship's location. My ex is gone forever. There is no way back now, Ouchimano's and my fate is connected irreversibly. I shall leave the moon with her, or I shall never leave.

The moon we are on now is dead. No flora or fauna present, only some carbon-yielding mushrooms can stay alive here. Sentinels presence is minimal. I have spent the past two days (like 12 hours of pure playing time) walking on that no-man's land, barely finding any trading point, not to mention any zinc. I wish she could help me in my journey, and so does she, but she is forced to ground until I succeed in the hunting. Sometimes the scaring thought that I will never again leave this moon flashes in my head.

I need your advice. I had enough pain of walking without a path. What would be the fastest way to find that 20 zinc without a ship on this barren land?

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    Step 1: Start a blog. Step 2: Outline this there. Step 3: Begin your personal odyssey to find it. Step 4: Publish your science fiction novel. I mean, this doesn't help with your issue, but I personally would Patreonise you
    – deworde
    Commented Aug 22, 2016 at 13:50
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    @Lyrion Yes, you need the pulse engine to take off. I know this because I'm working my way up to a 48 slot ship by finding and fixing crashed ships (which is a cost effective but very tedious process, FYI), and the only way I can get them to move is by fixing both the launch thruster and the pulse engine.
    – Mage Xy
    Commented Aug 22, 2016 at 14:59
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    Have you tried using your Exosuit's scanner to detect oxide signatures?
    – Dan Henderson
    Commented Aug 22, 2016 at 19:18
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    @MageXy How is fixing ships a way to earn money? I thought only finding and looting them yields useful stuff...
    – atripes
    Commented Aug 23, 2016 at 11:25
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    @AlexAffe MageXY said it was "cost effective" not a way to earn money. It's cheaper in monetary terms to salvage a bigger ship than to purchase the equivalent from a trader as you often need a few (supposedly available) resources. That said you need to be prepared to spend time hunting for the shops and gathering the resources, so it's not as efficient as just buying them.
    – Zhaph - Ben Duguid
    Commented Aug 25, 2016 at 7:55

3 Answers 3

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I literally had the exact same issue (apart from the ship name :P). Find a signal scanner and search for a beacon (select the transmission option). From the wiki:

A Beacon will always detect an alien lifeform at an Outpost.

And this is exactly what you want! Alien lifeforms are always at an outpost where you can trade. That is where you find your precious zinc.

Signal scanners are probably the most common building you can find on any planet or moon. Within 5 minutes of running, jumping and climbing you should have found at least one. You can also change the render distance to make sure you see them from a longer distance.

It takes time to do this, but after I had this issue I felt as if the role play in the game came to life. It was one of the best moments I ever had playing the game.

Good luck. Let me know how it goes!

Edit:

By the way. Once you're at the location the beacon directs you to there is always a landing station for a ship. You can call your ship using the computer at the edge of the platform.

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    Many thanks for providing me your way. Two path did I follow, your's and Udonan's; they lead me together. Beacon showed way to an Outpost; but had Udoan not warn me about the arriving ships, could I have not buy enough of the material. Ouchimano now flies again - and nothing could have make me more glad than the moment she first did after so much time. Our journey begins now - and forever will it last.
    – Neinstein
    Commented Aug 23, 2016 at 14:34
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Three ideas come to my mind:

  1. If you found a location with a landing pad that is not occupied by your precious Ouchimano, you could wait there for other traders to arrive and check their inventory. Occasionally space ships will land and if you're lucky one will have your Zinc.

  2. If your Ouchimano has any additional tech installed (I never found a ship without tech installed) you can dismantle it (R3 on PS4) to get back some of the resources that were required to craft it. When inspecting the tech it should show you which resources you will get.

  3. If you could manage to find your old ship - or any other crashed ship - you could dismantle the tech from there. Of course, this sounds hard without a ship to search with, in the first place. You should start by looking for a beacon. They are easy to spot since they emit that red light beam which can be seen from long distance. Use the beacon to search for transmissions. The results vary and you will find different transmissions. Repeat the search until you find a Transmission Tower. At the Transmission Tower use the interface inside and solve the puzzle. It will show you a close by crash site. There even is a chance it will show you the crash site you have already been to. Your old ship should still be sitting there.

I just had a closer look on my latest found crash site. 4 installed components here gave 25 Zinc each:

  • Photonix Core
  • Pulse Jet Sigma
  • Cannon Damage Tau
  • Cannon Damage Theta

For a Reflect Enhancement Theta I even got 150 Zinc.

So there should be a high chance you get the required Zinc right from the Ouchimano itself.

Good luck!

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    expanding on point 2: if i'm not mistaken some environmental protection modules in the exosuite contain zinc. those could be "harvested" as well.
    – garglblarg
    Commented Aug 22, 2016 at 12:29
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    For point 3: "close by" is a bit relative, here... I've gotten markers for crashed ships that are 6 hours away on foot before. It's still barely a quarter of the planet's circumference away, but it's definitely more than a hop, skip, and a jump.
    – Mage Xy
    Commented Aug 22, 2016 at 13:26
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    That's why i wrote it italic. Without a space ship pretty much nothing is close by. :)
    – udondan
    Commented Aug 22, 2016 at 13:32
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    Thank you for the suggestions. Ouchimano, though would give me everything he has, even she can't give me all I need; and, though it hurts me more than anything, I can't give her enough of myself. Our journey took us far away from my old partner: our road is one-way. Finding an Outpost, or another dying ship who would sacrifise herself, these seems to be our only chances. No matter how long it will take, our journey must continue.
    – Neinstein
    Commented Aug 22, 2016 at 16:17
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    @garglblarg That's actually a really good survival tip if you are looking for ships: if you aren't carrying around zinc in your cargo hold, make sure at least one suit upgrade can be recycled for it.
    – nailbones
    Commented Aug 23, 2016 at 17:26
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Just use your exosuit's scanner and look for the yellow Oxide icon. Even a "dead" planet or moon still has a lot of rocks, and a smattering of those flowers that look the same on every planet, but have different names. The yellow flower has Zinc (there's also a blue one with Platinum, a red one with Thamium9, and ones that refill your health, shield, or hazard protection). Most of the rocky things in caverns give an oxide, too, but that's usually Iron.

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    From what the OP describes his moon has no zinc "flowers." I encountered the same problem. Only iron, carbon, plutonium could be found. The OP said he has been wandering around for hours, if he hasn't found any zinc by now there is none available as harvestable resource at all. By the way, rocks never provide zinc.
    – Yates
    Commented Aug 22, 2016 at 16:12
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    @DanHenderson I agree with you. Zinc is a required material to fix the pulse engine, which is required to pilot your ship. I'm fairly certain that the zinc flowers appear on every planet/moon, regardless of climate, on the off chance that a brand new player spawns in that location. Forcing a new player to somehow infer they need to find a specific building in order to have a chance at progressing is way too convoluted. The flowers might be very rare, but I'm certain they exist.
    – Mage Xy
    Commented Aug 22, 2016 at 19:37
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    @DanHenderson I play on PC, and I've had the same situation as the OP. I travelled for hours upon hours scanning every time the cooldown ended. I can guarentee 100% that there are planets that do not contain all of the basic resources. This was 3-4 days ago. The planet I was on was red, no grass, tree's or whatnot, it was toxic yet never had a storm, only had iron and carbon INSIDE caves and plutonium could only be found rarely. There were no other resources.
    – Yates
    Commented Aug 22, 2016 at 19:40
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    Note for the original subject of the dispute :) during my journey I used my scanner many times, I descended deep into caves, almost got lost in one of them, and still, never had I find any zinc. Time convinced me: I will never see it again in it's natural presence until I leave Slipchant-8 Hainay.
    – Neinstein
    Commented Aug 22, 2016 at 23:33
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    @Neinstein I think I've also gotten it from killing a predatory creature, though that will probably be no easier to accomplish in your case.
    – Dan Henderson
    Commented Aug 22, 2016 at 23:36

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