Campaign Rulebook · v5
Salts Command Event

Zero to Hero

Frontier Survival Campaign for Star Citizen

Start as an isolated survivor with only the basics. Survive, scavenge, engineer, and earn your way back to civilization — through the surface, orbit, cities, orbital infrastructure, the local planetary system, and finally open space. These rules are not designed to make the game harder for the sake of difficulty. They are designed to shape a more organic survival story: explore instead of farm, discover before you buy, complete missions instead of exploiting locations, and let the universe pull you into varied gameplay.

🎧 Zero to Hero Challenge Briefing

Listen to the challenge overview while reviewing the rules below. The briefing explains the spirit of the campaign, the progression system, and why the restrictions exist.

01 — Purpose & Scope

The Campaign

This campaign is built around survival, scarcity, engineering, salvage, exploration, rescue gameplay, and content creation for Twitch, YouTube, and socials. The rules are meant to discourage common MMO habits — farming rare loot, repeating one optimal loop, camping high-value locations, or reducing the universe to a checklist — and instead push players toward organic discovery, mission-driven decisions, and a believable survivor-to-operator story.

02 — Tier Progression

Five Tiers, Zero to Open Space

You start at Tier 0 by default — it isn't earned. From there, every tier unlocks more of the 'verse and demands proof you've earned it. Each card below shows what opens up, what stays locked, and exactly what you need to advance.

Tier0

Atmospheric Survivor

Default Starting Tier
Unlocks
  • Surface survival
  • Ground vehicles
  • Atmospheric flight
  • Local economy at starting/outpost terminals
Restricted
  • No leaving atmosphere
  • No cities
  • No orbital stations
  • No off-world quantum travel
  • No city refueling
  • Same-planet QT only between locations on the current planet
Requirement to reach Tier 1

Full armor set, weapon, spare mags/ammo, food, drink, medical item, multitool, plus tractor-beam, mining, and salvage/repair attachments, at least one Cambio SRT canister, and 100,000 aUEC accumulated. (Optional: pay 50,000 aUEC for SALCOM life insurance / medical-beacon participation.)

Tier1

Orbital Survivor

Break Atmosphere · No Civilization Yet
Unlocks
  • Everything from Tier 0
  • Leave atmosphere
  • Remain in orbit
  • EVA operations
  • Orbital navigation
  • Unsupported EVA and recovery operations
  • Install/use found or salvaged ship shields
  • Install/use found or salvaged ship weapons
Restricted
  • No cities
  • No station landing or station use
  • No comm array access
  • No off-world quantum travel
  • Same-planet QT only between planetary locations on the current planet
  • No purchasing ship components
  • No purchasing shields, ship weapons, missiles, or engineering supplies
Requirement to reach Tier 2

300,000 aUEC accumulated and at least one ship component or ship weapon installed or upgraded.

Tier2

Civilization Reconnected

First Major Civilization Unlock
Unlocks
  • Cities in the local planetary area
  • City shopping, ASOP, refuel, repair, rearm, and restock services
  • Store access for discovered ship component classes
  • Store access for discovered ship weapons, shields, and missiles
  • Repair materials and engineering supplies
Restricted
  • No orbital stations
  • No comm arrays
  • No travel to other planets
  • No travel to moons yet
  • No open-system travel
Requirement to reach Tier 3

A fully equipped ship — all required components and ship-weapon slots filled and operational — plus 1,000,000 aUEC accumulated.

Tier3

Local Planetary System

The Neighborhood Opens Up
Unlocks
  • Primary planet
  • Local moons
  • Local cities and orbital stations
  • Comm arrays
  • L1/L2 Lagrange stations associated with the current planet
  • Local economy
  • Station services where legally accessible
  • Example: Hurston-based players may use Hurston, its moons, Everus Harbor, HUR-L1, and HUR-L2, but not ARC-L1
Restricted
  • No travel beyond the local planetary system
  • No unrestricted open-space travel outside the assigned planetary neighborhood
Requirement to reach Tier 4

Unlock the Jorret Dossier — Project Hyperion mission.

Tier4

Open Space

Final Tier · Full Operational Freedom
Unlocks
  • Open space
  • Planets and moons
  • Stellar stations
  • Deep-space infrastructure
  • Normal system travel
Restricted
  • No current travel restriction beyond future organizer-defined rules
Status

You've graduated from frontier survival to full system operator. Final tier under the current draft.

03 — The Drop

Starting Conditions

Starting Location

  • Every player starts at a separate random location.
  • Locations are picked by an organizer-approved randomization method from the approved list below.
  • The list only includes spots with buy/sell terminals, so everyone has basic local economic access.
  • No known easy-farming sites unless organizers explicitly approve them.
  • Exact method is TBD — dice, RNG, wheel spin, or organizer assignment.

Starting Character

  • You start with an undersuit and the standard starter/new-player helmet.
  • No armor beyond the starter helmet.
  • No weapons.
  • Everything you need to progress must be acquired through legal event gameplay.

Approved Starting Locations

Your drop is randomized across these approved sites — each has buy/sell terminals and a survivable footprint to begin Tier 0. Hurston and microTech only for this run.

No location selected
Click the button to randomly assign a starting location from the approved list.
LocationPlanet
Picker's FieldHurston
ZephyrHurston
FrostbitemicroTech
DunboromicroTech
Astor's ClearingmicroTech
04 — Hulls

Approved Starter Ships

Approved starters must have a logout bed, personal storage, and accessible physicalized components — and shouldn't be dedicated fighters.

ShipStatusReason / Notes
Drake CutterApprovedBed, storage, physicalized components, survival-friendly interior.
Drake Cutter RamblerApprovedBed, storage, physicalized components, strong survival theme.
Drake Cutter ScoutApprovedBed, storage, physicalized components, scouting theme.
RSI Aurora Mk IApprovedBed, storage, physicalized components.
RSI Aurora Mk IIApprovedBed, storage, physicalized components.
Gatac SyulenApprovedBed, storage, physicalized components, alien starter option.
Consolidated Outland NomadApprovedBed, storage, physicalized components, larger utility/cargo option.
Crusader IntrepidApprovedBed, storage, physicalized components, modern starter option.
MISC StarliteApprovedBed, storage, physicalized components; light refueler — fits the campaign's survival & self-refuel theme.

Starter Ship Prep

  • All fuses must be removed from ship storage before the challenge begins.
  • All Cambio SRT canisters must be removed from ship storage before the start.
  • Any similar pre-stocked engineering or repair consumables should be removed if organizers decide they bypass the survival start.
  • Starting components may include the quantum drive, radar, cooler(s), power plant, and required flight systems.
  • Ships may not begin with shields, ship weapons, or missiles installed.
  • The QT drive may stay installed from Tier 0. Same-planet quantum travel is allowed only between planetary locations on the current planet. Quantum travel may not be used to reach orbital stations, comm arrays, moons, or other planets until those destinations unlock by tier. Radar may remain. Found components are usable — travel limits still apply.
05 — Conduct & Systems

Core Rules

Communications

  • Coordinate gameplay only through in-game systems: voice, text, mobiGlas comms, and beacons.
  • Not allowed for coordination: Discord voice/text, Teamspeak, Steam chat, out-of-game DMs, or stream sniping.
  • External tools are fine for admin, tech support, scheduling, and organizer rulings — not for in-character navigation, rescue, trading, grouping, or mission coordination.
  • Mission sharing is not allowed until the later grouping phase of the challenge.

Medical, Death & Insurance

  • Medical beacons allowed at all tiers. Rescue gameplay is encouraged.
  • Medical imprinting is a recovery mechanism only. It may be used for bugs, crashes, server instability, desync, physics/elevator failures, organizer-approved technical issues, and PvP deaths.
  • Imprinting is not intended for normal gameplay, convenience travel, repositioning, or bypassing survival consequences.
  • Players may pay a 50,000 aUEC SALCOM Life Insurance / medical-beacon fee.
  • Insured players may use the simulated medical-beacon procedure when incapacitated; a third party may revive them via medical gameplay.
  • Procedures for uninsured incapacitation and unrecoverable non-PvP deaths are an organizer decision.

Components & Technology

  • Discover before you buy. Ship component classes must be found organically before they may be purchased from shops.
  • Discovery is tracked by class: shield generators, coolers, power plants, quantum drives, ship weapons, and any additional organizer-defined classes.
  • Finding one working example of a component class permanently unlocks that class for purchase once the player has legal access to a city or station shop that sells it.
  • Found, salvaged, recovered, looted, or rewarded components may be installed and used even before that class is purchasable.
  • Owning a component never authorizes breaking a travel restriction. An installed QT drive allows only the quantum travel permitted by the current tier; it does not grant off-world travel early.

Armor Progression

  • Armor may be worn if legitimately found, looted, recovered, rewarded, or purchased after unlock.
  • Armor purchases unlock after the player organically assembles one complete armor set.
  • A complete set consists of helmet, core, arms, legs, and backpack. The set may be light, medium, heavy, or mixed, as long as all five required pieces are acquired through legal gameplay.
  • Once a complete set is assembled, armor becomes purchasable whenever the player's current tier grants legal access to stores that sell armor.

Refueling & Restricted Farming

  • Refuel, repair, rearm, and restock only at locations your current tier legally allows. City services unlock at Tier 2. Station services unlock with station access at Tier 3.
  • Prohibited: server hopping for loot, alt-account gear transfers, and repeated exploit-style farming unless organizers allow it.
  • High-value loot locations include Cry-Astro, PAF sites, Onyx Facilities, and other organizer-designated premium loot locations.
  • Players may enter a high-value loot location only while actively completing a mission or contract that legitimately takes them there. That qualifying mission may be accepted once per play session.
  • During a qualifying mission, each player may loot one rare armor item or organizer-designated high-value item. The item may only be kept if the mission is completed successfully; if the mission fails or is abandoned, the item must be discarded.
  • If a player finds a rare armor piece for a slot they already possess, they may swap it by discarding the existing piece and keeping the newly found piece. Example: discard a Moonfall Palatino helmet to keep a Necropolis Palatino helmet.
  • Prior to Tier 3, standard Distribution Centers and ordinary loot locations may be visited at the player's own risk, provided no other rule is violated.

Logout, Ship Loss & Mission Sharing

  • No logging out on landing pads. Players must use approved logout methods and should not use landing pads as logout points.
  • No free ship claims. If a ship is destroyed, players may not use the free claim feature.
  • Insured claims only. Destroyed ships may only be reclaimed through the insured claim option once players have unlocked city ASOP access.
  • Ship insurance unlocks with legal city ASOP access at Tier 2. Once Tier 2 is unlocked, players can and should insure their ship at the ASOP terminal.
  • Mission sharing is not allowed yet. Group mission sharing unlocks later during the grouping phase, expected around Tier 5 or Tier 6.
06 — Reference

Detailed Tier Breakdown

The full per-tier reference. Tap a tier to expand its narrative role, travel rules, purchases, refueling, and advancement.

Tier 0 — Atmospheric Survivor
Narrative roleStranded/isolated on the frontier. Survive, gather supplies, get basic equipment, accumulate funds, become self-sufficient.
Starting gearUndersuit and standard starter/new-player helmet only. No armor beyond the starter helmet, no weapons.
Travel allowedWalking, ground vehicles, atmospheric flight across the planet or moon.
Travel restrictedLeaving atmosphere, orbit, stations, comm arrays, cities, and off-world quantum travel are prohibited. Same-planet quantum travel is allowed only between planetary locations on the current planet.
Ship rulesApproved starter only. May have QT drive, radar, cooler(s), power plant, flight systems. No starting shields/weapons/missiles. Found components may be used. Same-planet QT is allowed; off-world QT remains prohibited.
Purchases allowedFood, drink, medical items, weapons, ammo, multitools, and multitool attachments. Armor purchases require the armor discovery unlock.
Purchases restrictedShip components, ship weapons, shields, missiles, purchased engineering supplies.
RefuelingOnly where current restrictions allow. No city refueling.
Logout / ship lossNo logging out on landing pads. If a ship is destroyed, players may not use the free claim feature. Reclaiming requires the insured claim option after city ASOP access is unlocked.
Mission sharingMission sharing is not allowed during this phase of the challenge.
AdvancementFull armor, weapon, spare mags, food, drink, medical item, multitool, tractor-beam + mining + salvage/repair attachments, Cambio canister, and 100,000 aUEC. Optional 50,000 aUEC SALCOM insurance.
Tier 1 — Orbital Survivor
Narrative roleCan reach orbit but can't yet rely on stations or cities. Orbit is dangerous, unsupported, logistics-heavy.
Travel allowedAll Tier 0 travel plus leaving atmosphere, orbit, EVA, unsupported orbital navigation, and recovery operations.
Travel restrictedCities, orbital stations, station services, comm arrays, moons, and off-world quantum travel are still prohibited. Same-planet quantum travel remains allowed only between planetary locations on the current planet.
Ship rulesFound/salvaged ship weapons and shields may be installed and used. Components usable if found.
Purchases allowedSame personal gear as Tier 0.
Purchases restrictedShip components, shields, weapons, missiles, and engineering supplies may not be purchased.
RefuelingOnly where legally accessible. City and station refueling remain locked.
Advancement300,000 aUEC and at least one ship component or weapon installed or upgraded.
Tier 2 — Civilization Reconnected
Narrative roleAccess cities, city services, and local civilization while orbital infrastructure remains locked.
Travel allowedCities on the current planet, city services, surface travel, atmospheric travel, and same-planet QT between planetary locations.
Travel restrictedTravel to orbital stations, comm arrays, moons, other planets, and Lagrange stations is prohibited. Cities on the current planet are allowed. Example: a Hurston-based player may travel to Lorville, but may not travel to Everus Harbor, Aberdeen, HUR-L1, HUR-L2, or another planet.
Purchases allowedWeapons, ammo, discovered ship component classes, discovered ship weapons/shields/missiles, engineering supplies, repair materials, multitools, attachments, and armor after the armor discovery unlock.
Purchases restrictedUndiscovered ship component classes remain restricted for purchase. Armor remains restricted for purchase until the player has assembled one complete armor set. Orbital stations, comm arrays, moons, Lagrange stations, and open-system travel remain locked.
Ship requirementWork toward a fully equipped ship with all components and weapons installed.
AdvancementFully equipped ship (components + weapons operational) plus 1,000,000 aUEC.
Tier 3 — Local Planetary System
Narrative roleMove through the local planetary neighborhood, including moons and associated stations.
Travel allowedPrimary planet, local moons, local cities, local orbital stations, local economy, related infrastructure, and the L1/L2 Lagrange stations associated with the current planet.
Travel restrictedTravel beyond the local planetary system remains restricted.
Purchases allowedAll previously unlocked purchases remain available.
RefuelingCity services remain available. Station refueling, repair, rearm, restock, and other station services become available where station access is legal.
AdvancementUnlock the Jorret Dossier — Project Hyperion mission.
Tier 4 — Open Space
Narrative roleGraduated from survival to full system operator.
Travel allowedPlanets, moons, stellar stations, deep space, and open system travel.
Travel restrictedNone currently identified beyond future organizer rules.
Purchases allowedAll purchases unlocked unless future rules restrict specific loops or locations.
AdvancementFinal tier.
07 — System Notes

Finalized Rule Clarifications

Design intent: these rules exist to shape behavior and preserve immersion. They are not meant to punish players or add difficulty for its own sake; they are meant to reduce farming, encourage mission-driven play, and make progression feel earned.
TopicRule / Clarification
Mission access by tierMissions are accessible so long as the mission does not require the player to violate event rules or travel restrictions. Mission sharing remains locked until the later grouping phase of the challenge.
Quantum travelSame-planet QT is allowed between planetary locations on the current planet. QT may not be used to reach orbital stations, comm arrays, moons, Lagrange stations, or other planets until those destinations unlock by tier.
Medical imprintingImprinting is only allowed as a recovery mechanism for bugs, crashes, server instability, desync, physics/elevator failures, organizer-approved technical issues, and PvP deaths. It is not intended for normal gameplay, convenience travel, or bypassing survival consequences.
Discover before you buyPlayers may use legitimately found equipment, but purchases are gated by organic discovery. Ship component classes must be found before they can be purchased. Armor purchases unlock after the player assembles one complete five-piece armor set.
High-value loot locationsCry-Astro, PAF sites, Onyx Facilities, and other organizer-designated premium loot locations are mission-driven locations, not farming loops. Players need a mission or contract that takes them there, may accept that qualifying mission once per play session, and may keep one rare/high-value item only if the mission succeeds.
Rare armor swapsIf a player finds a rare armor piece for a slot they already possess, they may discard the existing piece and replace it with the newly found piece. This allows style progression without encouraging accumulation of every rare variant.
Local planetary systemAt Tier 3, survivors may access all locations on the current planet, its moons, orbiting stations, comm arrays, and the L1/L2 Lagrange stations associated with that planet. They may not travel to another planet's moons, cities, orbital stations, or Lagrange stations until Tier 4.

Think You'll Make It?

From undersuit to open space. Bring your survival game — and your stream. Questions and sign-ups happen in the Discord.

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