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A guide to getting 100% achievements.
Other Deep Sky Derelicts Guides:
The game requires at least one full playthough (in Hardcore mode), as well as several false starts and playing through arena mode. You will likely want to play through at least twice, the first time on Normal mode and the second on Hardcore mode.
Story Achievements
These are unmissable if you complete the game once:
- First of Many – Find one piece of location data.
- Glorious Monuments – Unlock the second tier of derelicts.
- Majestic Monoliths – Unlock the third tier of derelicts.
- You Made It – Reach the Mothership.
- Welcome, Citizen! – Enter the Mirror World. Beat the campaign.
Campaign Achievements
These require a partial or full campaign run to achieve. These are among the hardest and most time consuming because they take a full run. I suggest going for the full-run achievements on your first playthrough if possible.
No Fear of Zombies – Kill Necroguard without losing a character or retreating. You should get this in normal play by defeating a necroguard enemy. This is missable if you lose a character or retreat. It may be possible to avoid all necroguard fights, but there’s no need, they’re stronger then average, but not unbeatable. You can come back to them when you’re stronger if one if giving trouble.
Energy Adept – Never run out of energy during a single playthrough. Return to the home base whenever you get low on energy. Make sure you have energy cannisters as backup. Don’t start a fight if you’re low on energy.
No Step Back – Complete the game without ever retreating from combat. Don’t click the retreat button for the whole campaign. Best done on normal mode.
I’ll Buy My Own World – Have a cash balance of 100,000 credits. There are two ways to get this. 1) If you have one leader in your party, take the Negotiator ability that gives you bonus credits. Play a full campaign and you should get to 100,000 or close to it if you clear all of the derelicts and don’t spend too much. 2) [credit goes to I am Groot! in the forums] If you don’t want to play a full campaign, make a party with 3 leaders and give them all Negotiator. Now you can buy and sell back items at a profit so you can get to 100,000 by just visiting the store.
Executive and Greedy – Complete all side missions on a single playthrough. Each derelict has a side quest so you need to visit all derelicts and find and complete each side quest in one playthrough. This should pop before getting to the mothership if you save the mothership for last.
True Scavenger – Beat the game on Hardcore. I suggest playing on Normal mode first to learn the game. See the forums for discussions of good team builds and overall strategies. I used a leader, bruiser, medic.
Side Quests
There is one side quest per derelict. Sometimes they are associated with contracts from the bar. They can often be resolved with no fighting. Some of them have achievements associated with them and one has two mututally exclusive achievements associated with it. Not all side quests are available each playthrough so you may need multiple playthroughs to get all of these. There is an achievement called Executive and Greedy, listed above, for completing all side quests in a single playthrough.
Diligent Trashman – Collect 6 piles of trash for Arberi. You only need 3 piles to complete the quest. Keep searching until you get 6 before reporting back to Arberi to get the achievement.
Transhumanist – Help Espinoch transcend his flesh existence. Complete side quest involving Espinoch.
Standard Field Procedure – Collect and deliver fungus to Chapeau. Complete side quest involving Chapeau.
Appetite Ruined – Learn the secrets of eating in a space suit. Complete side quest.
The following two are mutually exclusive, either path completes the quest. Make a save and return to it to get both in a single playthrough. You will get a side quest from Salome who is being harassed by Parsons-T. Attack and kill Parsons-T to get Toil and tell Parsons-T about Salome to get Parsimony.
- Toil – Destroy Parson-T for Salome.
- Parsimony – Locate Salome and expose her to Parson-T.
This is not a side quest, but in one derelict you will find a rival scavenger group. The following two achievements are mutually exclusive. You should have the option to talk/trade or attack. If you talk to them, the option to attack is removed. Make a save and return to it to get both in a single playthrough.
- Smooth Talker – Get friendly with a rival scavenger group.
- This Ship is Too Small for Both of Us – Vanquish a rival scavenger group.
Not Like This – Visit the Mirror Worlds the bad way. On many derelicts after the starting ones, there are roving groups of martyrs. They show as enemies on the scanner, but they will not attack you, at least at first. You have the option to attack them. They are fairly difficult fights, so getting this achivement may be best attempted towards the end of the campaign. Once you attack and defeat a handful of groups of martyrs, you will get the option to surrender. This option only happens once! You must surrender to get the achievement. If you don’t surrender, any other martyr groups will attack without conversation. Note that this ends the game so don’t try this on Hardcore and make sure you have a save to return to. Or wait until you have finished a full run and then return to the derelicts to get this.
Combat Achievements
Flawless Victory – Win a combat encounter without receiving any damage. Will likely happen early and often, this is the most common achievment among Steam players.
No Time Wasted – Win a combat encounter in one round. Should happen in normal play. To ensure it happens, leave one enemy group alone in an early derelict and then come back to it when you’re stronger.
Houdini – Play 4 or more cards on a single turn. Certain cards allow you to play more cards. This is easier to get in energy rooms because you sometimes get energized (extra free action). There are also many class skills and bonuses which may grant extra card plays. I’m not sure of the exact game mechanics, but you can also save a card play for next turn by ending turn without playing a card.
Da Blast! – Deal over 100 points of damage with a single attack. Will likely happen normally towards the end of the game. I think this has to be one attack versus one enemy. Some easy ways to increase damage: focus damage, Tracker’s mark skill, or boost critical damage. It’s possible to do over 1000 damage, so hitting 100 should be no problem.
Massive Impact – Kill multiple enemies with one attack. Should happen in normal play. Use a weapon or skill (such as grenades or spread weapons) that targets multiple enemies at a time and finish off two in the same attack. As with No Time Wasted, you can leave one enemy group alone in an early derelict and then come back to it when you’re stronger.
Impenetrable – Have over 200 shield points on a character in combat. Technicians and tech cores have cards which allow for adding shielding above normal resting shield level. Keep stacking until you get to 200 shields. This goes well with the Trench Warfare achivement below.
Trench Warfare – Have a combat encounter that lasts for 50 rounds. This requires some planning. You want to find a combat encounter where the enemy can’t harm you (or you can replenish shields faster than they can be taken down), but at the same time you can’t run out of energy or let the enemy kill themselves through self-damage. Ideally, you would start combat with near full energy. Don’t throw out a Taunt Bot, because that increases the chance the enemy misfires. Then just keep hitting end turn until you get to 50 turns.
Advancement Achievements
Errand Boy – Complete a contract. You must take one of the contracts available at the Lair and complete it (gather a certain # of junk parts). Pay attention to the items which are part of contracts and don’t sell them as junk.
Prepared for Anything – Have all single character’s equipment slots filled. Each character has 4 core slots and each of those has 2 mod slots for a total of 12 slots to fill. You should have enough items by looting fallen enemies, random items found on derelicts, and buying from the shop, to get this fairly early on. I think I had it by the time my characters were level 3.
Fully Proficient – Max out an ability. Class abilities only have two or three slots, so this should be easy to get early.
Try’em All – Advance at least one character of each class to level 2. Requires a partial second playthough. The simple way to get this is to play once on Normal and once on Hardcore and select all 6 classes.
Never Too Versatile – Pick a specialization for a character. Happens at level 4.
Scavenger Elite – Get a character to level 10. Will likely happen before you beat the game as long as you don’t skip too many encounters along the way.
Overskilled – Raise a character’s skill to 200. Will likely happen normally in campaign mode. Some classes have abilities that add to skill level and otherwise you can stack cores and mods that add skill points. I think a Technician with two tech cores is the easiest way to get this.
Shiny! – Find and equip an Illustrious piece of gear. Illustrious gear has one very strong perk shown in yellow in the item stat box. Random, but should happen in normal play. Scavengers are more likely to find these.
Boffin – Build all research upgrades at the Research Workshop; there are 18 available. Note that you have to scroll down to see them all. The total cost is 19,450 credits. I had all of the upgrades by the time my characters were level 6 or so, but this will largely be dependent on how much healing you need to do, how much you earn and spend at the shop, and how much you value the upgrades.
Energy Achievements
These are based on the energy resource. You start with 1000 energy and can get up to 2000 by buying research upgrades. Energy is spent moving, scanning, clearing debris, and in combat. When energy depletes, you will automatically use an energy cannister if you have one in your inventory (they come in 100 and 300 energy sizes). If you run out of energy and cannisters, your shields will run down and then your health.
No Life Without Sacrifice – Convert a piece of loot into energy. Right click on any piece of junk and choose to convert to energy.
Oxygen Not Included – Lose an entire party due to energy depletion. Load up an old save and sell off all energy cannisters. Go to a derelict you’ve cleaned out and keep scanning until you get below ~50 energy and then walk around until your shields deplete and then keep walking around until you die.
Close Call – Successfully return to the station after running out of energy. Run out of energy like in Oxygen Not Included above, but go back to the station after running out of energy (and cannisters if you have any in your inventory).
Unnatural Achievements
Achievements for things you probably wouldn’t do in the normal course of playing the game.
Nobody Is Irreplaceable – Dismiss a character. Go to the den and dismiss a character.
Let’s Try an Intern – Hire a mercenary. Go to the den and hire a character. Must have one of your 3 slots open due to the death of a character or through dismissal (see Nobody Is Irreplaceable above).
Danger Zone – Enter a derelict two levels higher than your highest ranked character. When you unlock the second tier of derelicts, hopefully you are level 2 and now have access to level 4 derelicts. If not, you might get the chance as you unlock derelicts later.
Professional Pride – Go to a derelict with three characters of the same class. Generally not a good idea for a full campaign. Start a new game, select the same class for all 3 characters, enter a derelict, delete the save. Goes well with Uncontrollables below.
Uncontrollables – Go to a derelict with three aggressive characters. Generally not a good idea for a full campaign. Start a new game, select aggressive (+5% melee damage) for all 3 characters, enter a derelict, delete the save. Goes well with Professional Pride above.
Anti-Achievements
For some inexplicable reason, developers include achievements which are the opposite of achievements. Perhaps they include them for data gathering?
Rust in Peace – Lose a character in combat. Will likely happen in normal play.
Fresh Loot – Lose an entire party in combat. Don’t try this in Hardcore mode. May happen in normal play. If you want to get it, start a new game, get into combat, don’t play any cards.
Tenacity – Win a fight with only one character remaining. This is actaully hard to do on purpose. Load up an old save in normal mode and find a challenging fight. Kill all but one and then stop playing cards until you are down to one character left.
Animate – Revive a fallen character. Get a character killed and the med bay will give you the option of bringing them back, assuming you don’t wipe the whole party.
The Real Pain – Spend a total of 5000 credits on medical costs. In the course of a full campaign playthrough, you will likely get this unless you are doing very well. If you want to get this, maybe don’t have a medic in the group. You can always load an old save and take damage on purpose.
Game Over! – Lose an entire party in Hardcore mode. After you beat Hardcore mode, you can load your most recent save and get them killed.
Arena Achievements
You must win at arena mode to unlock these achievements:
- Bronze Medal – Advance past the 5th encounter in Arena mode.
- Silver Medal – Advance past the 10th encounter in Arena mode.
- Gold Medal – Advance past the 15th encounter in Arena mode.
- Arena Champion – Beat Arena mode.
I have not won arena myself, so I have no strategy advice. Please consult the forums for discussions about winning strategies.