Now that you’ve crafted yourself a Habitat Builder, it’s time to craft your first base! There’s a ton to learn about base building in Subnautica 2, and the more you explore, the more tech and furnishings you’ll unlock and the more resources you’ll have to spend. Toss all of that aside, this page is going to focus on the basics of creating your first port-in-the-storm in the game’s starting biome, including building locations, crafting rooms, installing power and most importantly, storage!

Page Breakdown¶

Base Location¶

Before you fuss over WHAT to build, you need to consider WHERE to build, and there are numerous factors that should influence your decision.

• Obviously you need to consider what’s in the area nearby - build near mineral deposits, Water Slugs and fish and you’ll be able to gather resources and find sustenance easier. In the first biome this isn’t that much of an issue, but you should still try to build it near something worth collecting.

• Don’t build your base too close to the Lifepod. The Lifepod isn’t a substitute for a base, but it does a good enough job with its limited Fabricator and storage and its environs are so placid that you really don’t need a base in the area.

• Don’t build too deep. Solar Panels are going to be your starting source of power and they don’t function well if you’re too deep. The first biome in the game usually won’t take you deeper than 100 meters, so it’s not that big of a deal here, but being within 50 meters (ideally closer) to the surface will make initial construction easier.

• Try to build near a natural current, if you can find one. Solar Panels are fine and all to start with, but you’ll want to upgrade to Hydroelectric Turbines eventually, and these need to be placed in natural currents. Just look for lighter-blue colored chutes that propel you along - you don’t even have to be all that close, as a Power Transmitter will ensure the turbine gets power to your base from a good distance - 100 meters or so should be close enough.

All these things considered, we build our first base on a ledge past Camp One, which itself is 200 meters north, northeast of the Lifepod. It’s far enough away that we don’t really want to have to travel there all the time, there’s Silver, Titanium, Lead and Quartz in the area, fish are abundant, Water Slugs take a bit of foraging but aren’t too scarce and there’s plenty of flora around, as well. We end up less than 20 meters away from both the surface and a current, checking two more boxes. The only downside is the presence of a Marrowbreach swimming around, which is more of a loud nuisance than a genuine threat, and the relative scarcity of Copper… but you can’t have everything.

Building Rooms¶

Bring some Titanium along, because the first thing you’re going to build is a Room - a square box on stilts that’ll serve as a place for you to keep all your stuff… including breathable air. Just equip the Habitat Builder, press to bring up the menu, then select a “Room” from the menu and move it around until the outline is green and in a place you’re happy with.

You’ll probably want more space than the generic Room gets by default, but if you head inside with your Habitat Builder equipped (you’ll need to construct a Hatch on the exterior of the room you built - it’s how you get inside, after all!) you’ll be able to incrementally add more space until you’re happy. You can also just build another room while building from outside your base (move the two rooms close enough and they’ll merge, if you want another way to just create a bigger room), or you can connect two separate rooms with a Corridor (read: tube), if that’s your cosmetic preference, but you can’t really build much in hatches, so they’re functionally dead space.

For now you just need one room. Spend the Titanium to create it and note that you cannot breathe while inside. “Life support” is a somewhat hidden function of bases that requires a modicum of power, as do many of the crafting stations and more interesting furnishings. We’ll get to all that later, but for now, let’s make this place breathable.

Power Generation¶

While in a base you’ll see a power meter on the top left of the screen, consisting of (usually) a ring with two colors. Blue is the excess power and red is the power being consumed. Lots of things consume power, including the Fabricator, NOA Terminal, Processor and Scanner Staiton, not to mention the undisclosed power drain of keeping the interior of your base lit up and supplied with breathable air.

Simply put, you’re going to need some power to make your base functional - staying dry doesn’t do you much good if you can’t breathe or build anything! At the beginning of the game you’ll likely only have access to Solar Panels, which at a glance generate a decent 1-8 power. The power generation of Solar Panels is incredibly fickle, producing almost nothing at night, and losing peak production the deeper under the waves your base is. You’ll want to put a few on the top of your base just to get an atmosphere in there, but you should avoid running any power-intensive stations (like the Processor and Scanner Station) at night when your power generation is low. Fortunately these devices only consume power when they’re actively being use, but some craftable stations have a persistent cost, so keep that in mind and stay simple until you can upgrade to Hydroelectric Turbines.

Base Storage¶

If you’re a pack rat, the beginning of Subnautica 2 can be pretty brutal, but fortunately that hindrance is almost entirely a thing of the past the second you build a base. Your options aren’t great at first, but the Wall Locker will get you 20 units of storage space and they can be build right into the wall, as their name suggests. Build one at the top and bottom of the same stretch of wall and you’ll get a lot of storage without using up any precious floor space.

Items stored in lockers will automatically be usable at nearby crafting stations and construction projects with a pretty generous range, so don’t be shy - line the walls with them, every available space! In fact, once you’ve got power going, you should make a second room just for Wall Lockers and crafting stations, so you’ve got everything you need handy in one place to make whatever new tools and resources you find blueprints for!

As for increasing your personal inventory, that’s another problem, with its own solutions…

Anyways, once you’ve got a base with an entry hatch, power for basic life support functions, and plenty of storage closets, you’re ready to start exploring in earnest and refining your original base into something bigger and better! But that’s a matter for another page…