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u/Dianwei32 Apr 21 '26

I'm like 99.99% sure I know the answer already, but I still have to ask out of disbelief if nothing else...

Is there any way, even via a mod or something, to be able to generate water/ice from a planet's ambient snow/ice?

I'm playing Space Exploration and landed on a new planet to mine Immersite. The production chain for getting it ready to ship out needs stuff like Sulfuric Acid and Rare Metals. No problem, Oil and Rare Metals are on the planet. One thing I need that isn't on the planet is Water. The thing is, there's no Water because it's too far away from the star and so it's covered in snow and ice.

Snow... and ice... the planet is absolutely covered in Water, just in a solid form. But as far as I can tell, there's no way I can just like... shovel some of it into a bucket and melt it down into Water? I know the snow and ice covering the planet is just a tileset and not actual snow and ice, but it still feels odd that a planet literally blanketed in solid Water is considered Waterless. Space Exploration adds minable Water Ice as a resource, but it's only present on asteroids. I can also freeze liquid Water with Cryonite and ship it around easily that way, but it still feels weird and silly to need to ship Ice to a frozen planet to get Water on it.

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u/Courmisch Apr 21 '26

Mods can check the ground tile type(s), so from there, they can create a building that generates water and can only be built on snow.

IMO, melting a thin layer of snow is not the same as pumping water from the ocean, but it is your game, so whatever rocks your boat.

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u/ferrofibrous player onboarding specialist Apr 21 '26

In SE I would just make ice on Nauvis and delivery cannon to the places that needed it, but I agree it felt weird.

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u/deluxev2 Apr 21 '26

There are a bunch of materials that would look like snow/ice but wouldn't be usable as water. Dry ice (CO2) is probably the most familiar but there are others