Shard

Shard

A scavenged fragment of dark archotechnology. Originally created by a hyperintelligent archotech mind, this shard is packed with technology beyond human comprehension. It is capable of manipulating psychic flows, inducing archotech influences and more esoteric outcomes. While it is useless by itself, it can be built into devices that harness its power to produce exotic effects.

Base Stats

Type

Exotic item

Market Value

400 

Stack Limit

5

Mass

0.6 kg

HP

250

Deterioration Rate

0

Flammability

0%

Rotatable

False

Path Cost

14 (48%)

Technical

defName

Shard

Shards are a somewhat rare resource added by the Anomaly DLC with a number of varied and powerful uses.

Acquisition

Shards can be acquired in the following ways:

1. Destroying certain entities:
   • Metalhorrors have a 50% chance to drop a shard when killed.
   • Nociospheres, if killed, will drop 2 shards.
   • Revenant spines, when smashed, will drop a shard.
   • The Dreadmeld, when killed, will drop 3 shards.
   • The fleshmass nucleus, when killed, will drop 2 shards.
   • Unnatural corpses, when destroyed, will drop a shard.
   • Obelisks allowed to reach max activity level or destroyed by damage will drop a single shard after exploding.
2. Gray boxes in the warped obelisk's labyrinth have a ~ 21.1% chance to contain a shard.
3. Flesh sacks have a ~ 3.91% chance to drop a shard when destroyed. Distress signals are guaranteed to spawn a flesh sack with a shard in it.
4. One shard can be obtained via The Anomaly starting scenario
5. Entity raids, including horax cult raids, have a chance scaling with raid points to give a random entity a hidden hediff that will cause it to drop a shard.

Raid points:

Graph	Raid Points	Shard Chance (%)
	0	15
	500	30
	1,000	50
	5,000	80

Usage

Shards are used in the following crafting recipes:

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Two shards are also required to deactivate the corrupted obelisk and twisted obelisk, while one is required to deactivate the golden cube.

Analysis

Shards are versatile and required for many aspects of Anomaly. While they are rare in the early game, they become more and more abundant: the colony will have more ways to farm shards and entity raids are more likely to drop shards. In addition, many of the buildings that require shards - such as shard beacons and serum labs - are capped or only one building is necessary.

Usage

It is wise to keep one or two shards on hand in reserve, in case of anomaly threats that require them to deactivate, with the next few shards used to produce ghouls. A few ghouls as melee units and melee blockers will make combat challenges easier, including fighting dreadmelds, one of the main sources of additional shards.

Farming methods

Beyond the natural amount of shards from distress signal quests and entity events, the following methods can be used to gain shards:

• Void provocation: Causes another entity event, which may provide a source of shards. A shard is not guaranteed, but void provocation is available in the early game.
• Provoke pit gate: Guaranteed to provide 3 shards if the dreadmeld can be defeated.
• Metalhorror farming: This involves intentionally containing and spreading a metalhorror infection, allowing metalhorrors to be farmed for their shards.

In addition, initiating the monolith endgame will cause metalhorrors to spawn, resulting in a lot of shards depending on raid points.

Gallery

• 

  One shard

• 

  Partial stack

• 

  Full stack

Version history

• Anomaly DLC Release - Added