Vision: Norwick STL University is an experimental, STL-only systems project designed to develop YK-649 into a sustainable commercial community—while serving as a hands-on university for new players to learn base design, logistics, vertical integration, finance, and production chain management.

Description: NSU is a crawl-walk-run program to teach a player base design, vertical integration, logistics planning, and asset management. Going through the entire program will see a player walk away with five bases and a glass-engine STL ship. Each base design was built by myself (Quicksolv | AGSI) and BlueOrange | TMI. The design for each base followed six constraints:

Base Design Constraints

1. Builds PIO/SET consumables or vertically integrates production
2. Creates excess of each good for profit
3. Costs less than 1,000,000 AIC
4. Daily expenses is under 100,000 AIC
5. 500t/500m3 Starter ship can import 3 days worth of production and workforce consumables and export 3 days worth of production outputs
6. Matches the COGC

However, a player participating with the university does not have to utilize these designs. The goal for the YK-649 system is a profitable and sustainable system. If a player wants to maximize profitability or run a hub-and-spoke logistics model that does not vertically integrate it is acceptable as long as the plans turn a profit and make sense for the player’s goals.

Quicksolv’s Suggested Path and Plans

Costs / Profit (as of 17 Jan 2026)

The construction cost of all five starter bases is ~3.8M AIC. Screenshots are included below from the PRUNPlanner Empire. This shows the daily cost, profit, and consumable production for both PIO and SET consumables. This does not include production information on all of the intermediate goods, everything produces excess that can additionally be sold for profit. Players should seek to acquire an STL-ship after establishing 3/5 bases.

The most significant imports will be H2O and SF which do create logistical challenges for players. We’re planning to reduce external H2O needs with our own imports.Efforts to reduce import burden on SF are ongoing.

Logistics Flows

Build Sequence (In series)

Building the planets one at a time has two main advantages: it allows the player to build up as funds become available, and it gives the flexibility to make a partial commitment. If you’re not sure about making a 5-base commitment to producing workforce consumables, the sequence in this section allows you to stop at any point in the series while still having a worthwhile business.

Norwick is the best choice for the first planet in the system. It is a triple-green planet, which means that no environment materials are required to build there. Inputs can be sourced easily from Harmonia (either from vertical integration or the local market) and the market for Food Industries products is consistently strong and reliable.

The second planet should typically be YK-649c, the Agriculture planet. This planet consumes food products from Norwick, and provides inputs to Norwick’s production.

When choosing which planet to do third, pay attention to market conditions. If you’re not satisfied with the profits you’re making from selling agriculture outputs, then build YK-649d (Resource Extraction) to turn the plants into carbon. (At the time of writing, carbon prices in Antares are consistently high. When you read this guide, check carbon prices: it’s possible that carbon production has increased as a result of people following this guide, driving prices down.)

If the carbon price is low, or the price of nutrient solution is high, then YK-649a (chemistry) might be a better choice. The intention with YK-649a is to consume carbon and turn it into polymer granulate, while also consuming imports and turning them into nutrient solution. Consider the reality of your situation.

Since there’s a relationship between carbon production on YK-649d and carbon consumption on YK-649a, it makes sense to follow one with the other.

Manufacturing on YK-649e would normally go last. It consumes PG from YK-649a, carbon from YK-649d, and various imports to make the consumables required by all the other bases in the system. But maybe you feel confident in your ability to source the materials and to market them to other players in the YK-649 system without hauling them back to Antares, in which case you might build the manufacturing base earlier. (If you’re not consuming yourself in-system or selling for local pickup, you’ll be better served with a manufacturing base closer to Antares Station.)

Build Sequence (Parallel)

Another option is to start by building all five bases at once, and to then continue building them up in parallel. This gives a very logistically efficient empire from day one, but does require over four million AIC in available capital (to cover the construction cost, consumables, inventory, and HQ upgrades). There are two main ways for new players to achieve that level of capital strength: one is to borrow from the banks, the other is to collaborate with other players. For players looking for a highly collaborative experience, dividing the bases between participants and balancing the logistics would be excellent practice for more complex collaborations aimed at producing high-tier manufactured products.

In this case, it might make sense to start with YK-649c, since it has the simplest input requirements, and then proceed to Norwick and YK-649d (these planets consume inputs from YK-649c). Then proceed to the somewhat more complex input requirements of YK-649a. YK-649e goes last, because it consumes inputs from all the other planets except YK-649c, sends supplies to all the other planets, and also requires a significant list of imports from outside the system.

FAQ

Why partial base plans?

The usual practice in Prosperous Universe is to plan bases out to use 500m of area, or very slightly less than 500m. These base designs deliberately use a lot less than 500m of area so that they can act as starting points, rather than final strategies. In this way, you can get a taste of a fairly large vertical integration in practice, without committing the massive funds required to build it out fully.

Why build BMP on the manufacturing planet, when pure WPL would be more profitable?

The starting point plans in this document are intended to showcase a possible vertical integration, they are not intended to be the most profitable possible use of these planets. They are intended to be reasonably profitable plans that will be relevant in a variety of market conditions. If we did somehow manage to come up with perfectly optimized plans that produce massive profit, the plans would become extremely popular. This would result in a dramatic increase in supply, which would drive down prices, which would mean the plans stop being profitable.

Why not build [building that isn’t in the plan]?

If the building in question requires ENG or SCI, then the governance strategy for the YK-649 system does not include any ENG or SCI population. These populations are expensive to support and require a strategic commitment that is beyond the means of the NSU project. This does leave a number of buildings (like SCA or LAB) that could be built, and might be profitable. However, they’re not obvious, and (if they need TECH) they might not reliably get workforce on a highly predictable schedule. That said, if you think a building should be in the plan, feel free to include it in your own personal plan, and to discuss your decision with other NSU participants.

The environment on these planets is expensive. Isn’t that a bad thing?

A lot of these planets do require HSE and INS, which significantly increases the cost of base construction and repair. There are cheaper bases people can build that might make more money. The other side of the coin is that the amount of money needed to provide logistics is significantly reduced. Also, it’s possible to spend 500K to build part of a base, but it’s not possible to spend 500K and build part of a ship. Reducing the financial hurdles associated with buying expensive ships is a key objective of the program. There are very firm opinions on both sides of this question, but very little evidence. By testing the proposition in the field, NSU will be able to provide evidence.

Shouldn’t I do my starter ship upgrades to WCB before building more ships?

Yes, you should. The WCB upgrade is the most cost-effective upgrade to your logistics capacity that you can do.

Am I better off with one or more GEN STL ships, or with something bigger?

We don’t know. This is going to depend on your real-life availability to order ship movements, the rate of your base expansion, your level of focus on exports, your personal preferences, ship prices, and other factors that we haven’t imagined (let alone reliably predicted). We plan to run tests, and we encourage you to report your findings too. It might even be viable to run GEN ships that are larger than 500/500, although most people report that a GEN with a heavier cargo hold becomes unbearably slow.

Do I need to build all of these bases?

No. The 5-base strategy is an option for you to consider. We like the way it all fits together neatly at the end. Maybe all you want to do is to produce COF, in which case planets B and C are plenty. Or maybe you’re sitting on a stockpile of nitrogen and all you want to do is make NS and sell it on the local market at C. Or maybe you’re supplying your carbon to the metallurgy industry, and so feeding it into chemistry and manufacturing doesn’t make sense for you. It suits us (the authors) if you build everything and help us test out the 5-base STL concept. But you should never do something that doesn’t suit you.

Can you help me with finance? Or sourcing the base building materials? How about water?

We’ve developed some commercial offers to help people take part, and we’d be delighted to sell you some things. However, we want to keep those commercial offers separate from the educational offer. Partly because we want to leave the door open for alternative offers, and partly because the offers we’re making might change over time. Please look us up on the ADI discord and we’ll be happy to point you to the current offers.

Appendix A: Financial and logistical reports

Appendix B: Glass Engine STL Blueprint

NSU Contributions and Milestones:

[ 20260112 ] 2.8M AIC from Phobos Parliament for YK-649c ADM, COGC, WAR, POPI
[ 20260115 ] 10,000 H2O from Zipatsu
[ 20260116 ] YK-649c Settled {Quicksolv}
[ 20260117 ] 3M AIC from Phobos Parliament for YK-649a ADM, COGC, WAR, POPI
[ 20260118 ] YK-649a Settled {BlueOrange}
[ 20260222 ] 3M AIC from Phobos Parliament for YK-649d ADM, COGC, WAR, POPI