Welcome fellow Mercenaries and bounty hunters!

This guide will cover different elements of the game that can help you understand game mechanics and enemy counters apart from the in-game manuals and codexes around the ships.

This guide is now majority complete besides adjusting some numbers and maybe revising sections to be more clear. I will update this guide further when changes are made or new content is added.

Found around the mission ship (HSS Hawking), you will find various things to scavenge and loot. Here are some things about these mechanics:

Respawn Capsule:


Uses: 1 active per player
Initially you will have no respawns, but once you claim a respawn point, you will activate the team life system. Default is 9 team lives, but will change depending on mission difficulty. Make sure to claim one once the power is on, or risk permadeath!
Note: Respawn points only work when there is power. If the power is down for any reason, then it will need to be started again at the command deck.

Ammo crate:


Uses: Unlimited
Found within armory rooms around the ship, will fully restock and reload your current weapons ammo when used. The ammo stashes carry infinite ammo, so don't worry about using them frequently. Some missions have a modifier that makes using this item cost 100 credits from the final payout.

Health stations:


Uses: 5?
These are green boxes found around the ship. These have limited uses and the usage around is seen from the green liquid in the machine. It will also cure poison. Some missions have a modifier that makes using this item cost 100 credits from the final payout.

Emergency Box:


Uses: Unlimited
Only used during a self-destruct sequence. Provides an adrenaline shot for unlimited stamina for about maybe 15 secs. 2-3 max will be needed to make the trip from engine room to the shuttle bay.

Money loot:


There are also loose credits (average 5-15 credits per drop) and unknown hard drives that you can collect. Loose credits are not shown in end mission payout, but is added directly to your wallet. Unknown hard drives are worth 100 credits each if you extract with them.

If you die, you will spawn again with only the pistol and will have to pick up your loot from where you died.

Death:
If you die, you will suffer a 100 credit penalty to the mission payout, which is not too bad.
Be warned, if you die permanently, then you will get no payout once the mission is over. Other players can donate some of their payout to you.

There are 4 main contract types: Kill the Specimen, Destroy the Area, Capture the Specimen, and Extract the data


Note: Different objectives can be done while on another mission, as you can cause a self-destruct on any mission (provided the main objective is not done, captured specimen and secured black box prevents engines from reaching critical), but you can only kill the monster on the eliminate and capture missions. Black boxes only spawn on extract missions.

Extract Black box:


The objective will have you extract a black box, which is located in 1 of 2 server rooms. These can be either the captain's Quarters or behind the Engine Bay's power control room. The one you need will be marked on the map with a purple icon. Once picked up, you can't use any items (except flashlight) until you drop it. Any throwables including this box can't take damage, so don't worry about throwing it down a flight of stairs. It must be brought back to the shuttle and secured at the slot next to the flight seats. When first grabbed, the monster will become more active and aggressive until you evacuate. Be prepared to rush back to the shuttle.

Provides specimen data, and needs to be done 4 times for each monster.

Destroy the Ship:
Ok Dead Space enthusiasts, ready to fix (and destroy) the Ishimura again?


The goal is to access the main Power Control panel in the Engine Bay and start the engine test, then go to Engines A and B from upstairs. In the control rooms of each engine, increase the speed ever so slightly by 1000% to overload the engines. Once the 2nd engine hits critical, the emergency evacuation will begin. This will self-destruct the ship.

Once self-destruct begins, a couple minute countdown will begin (changes with difficulty) where you must reach the shuttle and escape. Along the way those emergency containers will open up and give unlimited adrenaline shots, which provide unlimited stamina for a short amount of time. Also, all mission objectives are terminated when the self-destruct starts, so collect everything you want before starting it. The monster will also be very active, most likely spawning in the core engine room to attack you. The required path to run from engine room to shuttle is the same every time, and so too are the spawns of the adrenaline shot. You will need only 2-3 adrenaline shots depending on stamina upgrade level, and you can be killed when using it if the monster is there, so plan which ones to use accordingly!

Kill/Capture the Specimen:
These two missions function the same, the only change is the end goal.
You will need to find the elemental Category 3 weapon shown on the command deck/mini-map that correlates with the current mission's monster weakness. Once you have the gun, then you either challenge the monster in a favorable location (I prefer the main engine room or Captains's Quarters intersection; it's open with few vents and both ammo and health nearby), or head back to the ship.
To Kill, many of the monsters are very health spongy (except the robot, the laser does a lot of damage to it) so be patient and use the elemental weapon to damage it or expose the weakpoint while friends shoot it with guns (Kill strategies covered further in enemies section).
Capturing is easier since you only need to stun it within the shuttle's containment cell, and energy shields are highly recommended for the capture. Capturing might take a few tries, since some specimens are finicky when it comes to stuns, so keep trying and make sure the specimen is stunned in the middle against the glass (as far away from either cell door as possible) so it has less time to flee the cell.

For specimen data, only one capture and 4 kills are needed per creature.

There are currently 5 enemies in the game, with plans to add at least 2 more. So far they don't have names, but rather ID numbers tied to them in the specimen terminals found on the HSS Hawking. Difficulties affect the damage they inflict, their movement speed, and how alert they are, and the amount of damage needed to stagger or make them flee (possibly their health too).

Note: During neutralize missions, all creatures will flee during the fight and hide somewhere on the ship before attacking again. Sometimes they may not return but instead just hide on the ship somewhere. Some (maybe all?) hide in the same spots of the sector you are fighting them in.
Machinery/Engine room = Fuel Treatment Hub
Crew Quarters = Scientist's Dormitories, Room 16
Shuttle Bay = Laboratory main Hallway (next to command deck entrance)
I noticed that Subject's ID-006, ID-007, and ID-009 hide in these same areas if they didn't come back to where I fought them originally. You can verify if they are hiding here based on the directional audio cues like roars.

ID-006 - Baby Squid


Weakness: Flamethrower (Orange flame icon on map)
This little guy functions like a basic enemy, as it will look at you and attack by running at you, inflicts regular damage, and also an instant kill by jumping on your head. If it attaches to someone, it can be shot off before decapitation, even in solo by shooting the directly at the center of the squid. It is weak and afraid to fire, so red explosive canisters are your friend. Also, it will leave after you unload a gun into it, so when it attacks, just keep shooting until it goes into a vent. It can traverse vents. It makes bubbly squishy noises, and acts almost like a youngling as it will observe you momentarily before attacking. NOTE: There is a small chance it will not attack you and only stare at you if you group up with a friend and do not shoot it on sight. However, if it rushes or follows you quickly, it will attack.

Guns and explosives will damage it, and will make it leave once damaged enough. BEWARE: It can play dead. After being shot it may stop moving and lie motionless. After 5-10 seconds, it will get up and run away (or attack). Make it play dead from a flamethrower in a containment cell to capture it.

Elimination/Capture:
Use gunfire until it falls over and plays dead. Close containment cell when this happens for capture. Otherwise, use flamethrower to burn it until the canister is empty, then mag dump it with gunfire until a body part or the whole body pops. Damage states can be determined based on burnt skin, missing eyeball, then head chunk.

ID-007 - Ethereal Ghost:


Weakness: Freeze gun (Blue icicle symbol on map).
Omnipotent shadow being that appears randomly to make it look at you. Simply do not look at it until it vanishes. Will only damage/instant kill you if you look at it, otherwise it is harmless. It can be heard roaring from across the map and can be heard spawning in when you hear ash or leaves rustling, same sound when he teleports or leaves.

Guns and explosives do nothing until frozen. (Elimination mission exclusive)

Elimination/Capture:
Spray with the Freeze gun, then close cell door during transformation. Otherwise, when frozen, it will become a physical zombie dog for about 5 seconds before transforming back into the original form and instantly teleport away. During physical form, shoot it with regular weapons and especially freeze containers (Do not use fire containers or flamethrowers, it will make it transform back instantly). Keep doing this until it croaks and breaks its back in a weird pose.

ID-008 - Clamp Robot:


Weakness: Laser Gun
This rogue Aperture science drone will fly around and only has 1 attack; a short lunge that will insta-kill you if caught, but can be dodged a second before it launches. It normally has a blue light eye that shines forward a bit, and turns red when you are spotted. If you are in a vent when you're spotted, then it was nice knowing you.

Guns and explosives do nothing until it is hit by a laser. (Elimination mission exclusive)

Elimination/Capture:
When hit by the laser gun, it will be stunned and enter a different form. During this process, close the cell door to capture. Otherwise, it will sprout legs, permanently lose its shield, and become a fast jittery spider, where the insta-kill is replaced with standard slashes. It will attack until enough damage is inflicted upon it by either laser or standard gunfire, then EMP the ship before fleeing. You will need to restart the power again from the command deck or risk fighting the enemy with no respawn capsules. Once power is back on, your previous respawn point automatically activates, so don't worry about claiming another/new one. It will keep doing this until it spins rapidly and explodes.

ID-009 - Dog-like Necromorph:


Weakness: Electrical gun
Basic enemy type that runs at you when your spotted, and will slash at you to slowly take away health. If it sees you, just keep running around the ship until it leaves you alone, since it has low stamina. Try to lose Line of sight if possible, as this creature relies on vision first, sound second to track. This is a blessing and a curse though, since it is easy to lose by taking twisting turns and hiding behind boxes to lose it, but a curse since it can easily lose you when luring it to the shuttle for capture. It roars loudly and makes loud stomping noises, and will also use the vents to traverse around. Do not crouch near it, or it will instant kill you.

Guns and explosives slow it down, and (might) run away if damaged enough. Aim for the face.

Elimination/Capture:
The face briefly opens up when hit with electric gun, so shoot there with regular guns, preferably the Shotgun or Laser gun. When zapped, close the cell door to capture. After it runs away from major weakpoint damage, half the face will be exposed, followed by the face armor being gone completely. Keep doing headshots to kill it, and aim for the open flesh on the head until the head is blown off completely.

ID-010 - Zombie Scorpion


Weakness: Flamethrower
Stealthy creature that creates zombies from the existing corpses. Will hide from you in vents, will make hissing xenomorph noises and vents will bleed purple if it is hiding in it. Avoid the vent by going around it, or else it will sting you with poison. It does standard slashing attacks but will not attack directly unless no corpses are nearby, you are under a vent it is hiding it, or an event like self-destruct/black box extraction begins. Try to not get stung by it, as you will have 1 min to heal (affected by difficulty) with a health injector or healing station before dying. NOTE: Zombies are 1-shot to the head, but hard and nightmare difficulty will take 2-shots.

Guns and explosives will momentarily stun it, but it will keep chasing if no corpses are nearby (or mission event starts). Fire is needed to burn corpses.

Elimination/Capture:
Burn all zombie corpses with the flamethrower in an area until the scorpion shows up. From here, just shoot it until it retreats into a vent (the purple gas is harmless) and keep doing this until it is dead. The flamethrower is good for stunning it, and other players can shoot it while one person burns it. Otherwise, stay near a heal station in case of poison. For capture, shoot it in the contaiment cell while it closes, shield highly recommended.

There are 3 main guns in the game, classified as Category 2 guns, and all of them (Except the pistol) are found around the HSS Hawking. You can carry 3 total guns at once, either two Category 2/3 weapons and the pistol, or three guns. Pistol is stuck to you unless the mission has modifier to remove Category 1 guns.

These guns are found on corpses of crew members wearing gold armor:


NOTE: Gun damage values are not shown normally, although it can be tested with friendly fire penalties. There is also an unknown headshot damage bonus on zombies, and no headshot damage on teammates.

Shotgun: Category 2
Damage: 84 per shell (if all pellets hit)
Ammo: 5 shells, 15 reserve
Pump shotgun. Requires direct shot at very close range for high damage/stun potential. Personally found this the best standard gun in the game

Assault Rifle: Category 2
Damage: 12 per bullet
Ammo: 30 rounds, 90 reserve
Full auto rifle. Nice balance of damage and fire rate, although can struggle with ammo if you encounter the monster too much.

SMG: Category 2
Damage: 8 per bullet
Ammo: 40 rounds, 150 reserve
Rapid fire SMG. Nice spray and pray type gun with lots of ammo, great for zombies.

Pistol: Category 1
Damage: 8 per bullet (16% shield damage)
Ammo: 15 rounds, 60 reserve
Semi-auto handgun. Better than nothing. Only use in emergencies and shooting canisters, otherwise it is the worst gun in the game.
Acquired after completing first mission as a reward.



You will always spawn with it once unlocked.

Explosive canisters are found around the ship. Red is incendiary, blue is cryo freeze. Both can slow down monsters if shot with any gun. Red canisters leave fire residue behind for a short time, and causes little damage if you walk into it.

Red Explosive:


Blue Freeze:


On neutralize missions, there will be 4 unique elemental/Category 3 weapons: Laser, Electric, Flamethrower, and Freeze.
You only need the one that correlates to the monster on that mission, like laser for the floating robot, but some are versatile and still work great as a general firearm. All guns can be refilled at ammo crates, including the special guns.



Laser gun: Category 3
Ammo: 50 energy, 150 reserve?
1 second activation charge that fires a thin laser beam. Pretty high damage.

Electrical gun: Category 3
Ammo: 1 shot, 3 reserve
Long (about 4-5 seconds?) charge up arc gun. Energy shield is great to pair with this, since it can charge up while using the shield.

Flamethrower: Category 3
Ammo: 60 fuel, 120 reserve
Standard flamethrower. Inflicts burn effect which lingers for a bit.

Frost gun: Category 3
Ammo: 50 mag, 150? reserve
Acts like flamethrower, but with freeze elements. Also has quick 1 second charge time before firing. Not useful unless fighting ID-007.

Out of the Category 3 weapons, ignoring monster weaknesses, I found the laser gun the strongest, with flamethrower and frost gun being about equal in damage, and the electrical gun the hardest to use. The laser beam can deal very high damage if majority of beam duration hits (rivaling the shotgun but w/o the need to make the single shot land), so this would be good for situations like ID-009's weakpoint when exposed and stunned by the electric gun.
Flamethrower and Frost gun are functionally the same but opposite elements, and flamethrower is great for handling the monsters that are weak to fire, so these are both good for their intended purpose.
Electrical gun is tricky to use due to the long charge up time and one shot mag that requires a reload per shot. Thankfully ID-009 is the only creature that is weak to this element and only needs the head to be hit at least once during the electric arc blast, but otherwise it is not reliable.

There are 4 tools in the game, and you start with the mini-map. You can only carry one tool per mission, and can select it from the personal terminal located in each person's spawn room or the shuttle's living quarters.

Mini-map:


Acts as portable command deck map, shows locked/unlocked doors, important mission elements like specialist/Category 3 guns on neutralize missions and black box for extraction missions, and shows armory/infirmary. Upgrades increases map range.

Threat detector:


Pings enemies on the radar. Upgrades increase threat range detection.

Health Injector:


Functions like a portable infirmary, and fully heals/cures you or other players. Can be fully refilled at infirmary stations. Great for dealing with the ID-010 (Zombie Scorpion), as it can help quickly cure you from the poison. Starts with 2 injections and can be upgraded to 4.

Energy Shield:


Fully protects against all attacks and friendly fire, including instant kills (if parried). It also might save you from ID-006 (Squid) grab attack if you keep it out before it decapitates you, but only stops ID-008 (Robot) if done before the grab. Will fully regenerate to 100% over time, with upgrades increasing regen speed and solidity. When maxed out, the recharge rate is 2% every .5 seconds, so it will recharge very quickly. It can also be dual-wielded with every gun, so you can hip-fire any gun with the shield active (Even the pump shotgun somehow!).
Warning: Using it will flashbang you per use due to high brightness.

Personally I found Energy Shield the most useful, especially with enemies that have instant-kill potential and for capture/kill missions. It becomes more versatile the harder the difficulty, as it can help get out of dead-end hallways or distract the creature for your team due to the shield blocking the hit and making the monsters flinch.
The Health Injector is only really needed for curing the poison against scorpion, so it is good for someone who wants to be a team medic.
Threat Detector currently is not needed, as all monsters are loud or have sound ques that tell their location, only current use would be one team member tracking the monster during a kill mission. Eventually it will be more useful when new creatures are added, as one will be more stealthy and sneak up on players (ID-004).
Mini-map is a great beginner tool and good for casual play or looting efficiently.

The HSS Hawking is divided into 3 sectors, although only 2 are currently available. Laboratory will be added in a later update, but Crew Quarters (Blue) and Machinery (Orange) are the sectors.


Crew Quarters:
In the Crew Quarters sector, the goal is to gather Security Passes to unlock the Officer's Quarters. The Officer's Quarters contains the Captain's room, 4 cabin rooms, a small storage room, and one server room. It also contains a shortcut to the Engine Bay.

The Security passes will be located across the Crew Quarters in Worker's dorms, Scientist's dorms and the center Cafeteria. The number of security passes needed will change based on number of players.
4 for solo, 6 for duo, 7 for trio, and 8 for squad.


This area can potentially spawn 2 elemental Category 3 guns for Neutralize/Capture missions, and the Black box for an Extract mission.

Machinery:
In the Machinery sector, you will need to access the Main core room, which can be done by turning valves marked red in the core control room's terminal. It contains the Turbine room, Fuel Treatment Hub, and Core Control.

There are blue and red pipes with levers being numbered, Red is located in the Fuel Treatment Hub with the water floor, and Blue is located in the room next to the Core Control room (with the terminal) and the Turbine room. No Category 3 guns spawn here and no server room for the black box


Blue Valve labeled 7:


Make a note of the red numbers and turn those valves (the number of valves to turn in each area depends on number of players, so 2 valves for solo, 3 for duo, 4 for trio, and 5 for squad). Once that is done, you can access the Main Core room, where you will need to time it and run past it to the next door, or get fried and die instantly. You can alternatively access the Officer's Quarters with the security pass cards and take the hallway at the end of the 4 officer cabins that bypasses the main core and goes straight to the Engine Bay.

Engine Bay:
The Engine Bay is marked as part of Machinery sector, but can be accessed by 2 (eventually 3) ways. The Engine Bay contains Engine Room A & B, a server room, and the main engine control room. 2 Category 3 guns can spawn here in either Engine room for Neutralize/Capture missions, the Engines to overload are here for the Destroy mission, and a Black box can spawn here for the Extract mission.

Power:
When you arrive on the abandoned ship, the power will be off (unless a modifier is active to have it start on). The monster can be heard while you navigate to the command deck, but will not attack until the power is on (Zombies are an exception).

Safe rooms:


There are 2 safe rooms on map, the control hub center where you open up doors to each sector, and the shuttle you arrived on. The hub has a button to lock the door and shutter the windows, while the shuttle is just closing the airlock door before the monster enters. You are completely safe in these rooms until you need to leave.
P.S. Don't attempt to trap the monster in the room by locking it in with you. Doors will automatically open after 3 seconds if a monster is in there.

Vents:
All creatures can travel in vents, but only the crew deck has vents that you can use. Entrances are the infirmary to access the 4 officer cabins and the storage room to access the server room and captain's room. You are very vulnerable in the vent, so go in prepped or when your sure the monster is not nearby.

Storage room:


Infirmary:


Shortcuts:
The ship is interconnected via some hallways that loop around. For example, you can access the Engine room directly through machinery, or by unlocking the crew deck's Officers Quarters area and taking the engine room hallway next to the officer cabins, entirely bypassing machinery. In the engine room you can also open a shortcut back to core control and machinery to skip the reactor core room.

Note: Eventually there will be additional shortcuts utilizing the Laboratory when it is added.

Thanks for reading!
Hopefully this guide is helpful, and let me know if there is something else you want me to add or if you have any questions!