#Biorico North Pole Base

[msbarrows]

I had so much fun building this base. It’s on my underwater base world, Biorico, because I love the climate and the lack of sentinels and the pretty. Also my friendly neighbourhood sandworm. I’ve now encountered other members of his (or her, or its) species on other planets, but the one on Biorico will always be THE sandworm for me, since it was my first sighting, and I have since seen it leap by me at my base there so. many. times.

Anyway, every time I end up on a reddit post when looking up anything No Man’s Sky related, one of the “other posts you might like” recommendations that pretty much always shows up is a post where some guy found a point on a planet that was pretty much perpetual sunsets and sunrises, no nights. One theory mentioned for it in the discussion was he was at his planet’s north pole, and the NMS mechanic of the sun revolving around fixed planets (because it’s simpler from a programming perspective, apparently) means that he was standing at a spot that was, essentially, getting non-stop white nights (no precession in NMS either).

Sounds neat, I thought, and decided to check one of the poles of my own favourite planet to see if I had the same effect going on. So I jumped in my starship, glanced at the compass, saw I was already facing almost due north, and went thataway. For probably a good 15-20 minutes if not longer, with occasional stops to get out and drop a marker so that if pirates interrupted my flight I could resume it from more-or-less the same place rather than restarting at some random other point on the surface (thankfully they declined to harass me, though I bet if I hadn’t been dropping markers, they would have). Crossed a lot of ocean and then several mountain ranges, and eventually hit a point high up in some mountains where the N on the compass went off to one side and the S suddenly took its place. Landed on the nearest peak, found N again, and ran that way (not very far, just down one short slope) until I found a place where the N vanished and couldn't be found, but if I took a few steps in any direction, I’d suddenly be facing S again. It was on a very pretty shelf just down from the peak, so that’s where I chose to build this base.

The lighting thing? Not so much. My theory is that the N-S axis of the planets are a little tilted in relation to the axis around which the sun rotates, so while there is a point somewhere on their surface where you can find the perpetual sunrises/sunsets effect going on, it’s not necessarily right at the poles. I did note down how long full daylight lasts at the base (according to the solar panel it’s 15 minutes) and will check my bases elsewhere on Biorico to see if they have a different length of  day, because unless I’m misremembering what very little I know about orbital mechanics, the daylight should last for different lengths of time at different points on the surface.

While I’m disappointed about not getting white nights going on, I wanted to build a base there anyway. Decided to go with an aesthetic of “someone found a ruin that was in good condition and added on to it”, so part of the building is meant to be the stone ruin, and the rest is added on with wood. Lots of expanses of glass since being at a height means it has some pretty spectacular views.

Sectioned off the bits to either side of the tower to be a bedroom (to right as you enter the tower) and office (on the left). There’s also a living room area on the right, and a kitchen/dining area on the left. Utility area down under, behind the tower stairs. There’s a patio area built out from the bridge-like part of the ruin, with great views in two directions. The little squat stone building near the tower entrance is where I put the teleporter; I find they often do poorly in elevated structures, so I wanted it as close to actual ground as I could manage. And of course I added a landing pad, as there’s very little good real estate for a ship to set down on there otherwise.

Oh, and of course my really huge friend leapt by a couple times while it was under construction, wanting to see what I was up to way up north: