Starfield:Grunt Work

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Investigate a comms blackout on Tau Ceti II. Mission Giver: John Tuala Location(s): Tau Gourmet Production Center ID: UC02 Rewards XP: 250 Credits ?: Faction Medium plus 1,000 if you are UC Native Other Rewards: UC Vanguard Spacesuit UC Vanguard Space Helmet UC Vanguard Pilot Backpack Access to all UC Vanguard Ship Modules ← Previous Concurrent Next → Supra et Ultra Delivering Devils, Deep Cover

Official Summary

"The player has received their first mission with the Vanguard - deliver a few antenna on the distant world of Tau Ceti II - but get there to discover the entire settlement has been killed. There they meet, Hadrian, a former Xenowarfare researcher come to this world to find out how a Terrormorph got all the way here. The player and Hadrian take the Terrormorph down, at which point Hadrian makes a discovery - this Terrormorph appears to have come out of nowhere."

Quick Walkthrough

1. Talk to John Tuala.
2. Talk to Chief Herath.
3. Explore the Tau Gourmet Production Center.
4. Talk to Hadrian.
5. Kill the Terrormorph.
6. Return to Hadrian.
7. Return to Tuala.

Detailed Walkthrough

Mission Briefing

Having completed your simulation test, Commander Tuala assigns you your first, probationary mission as a member of the UC Vanguard - travel to a colony that has fallen out of contact and repair their comms system. You are first sent to Crew Chief Kane Herath at the spaceport pad B, who will have the replacement comms array delivered to your ship, along with an Urban Eagle, ammunition, and some UC BattleMeals. Once you've loaded up, take off, jump to Tau Ceti II, and land at the Tau Gourmet Production Center.

Terror on Tau Ceti II

It quickly becomes apparent that the production center has bigger problems than a broken comms array. Descending from your landing site, you will pass another, inaccessible ship, and arrive at the living quarters, where you will find a dead colonist. Beyond that, a broken elevator and winding stairway will take you down to another landing pad. As you descend, you will hear a scream coming from the main complex.

As you approach the main complex, you are contacted by a woman who asks you to meet her in an office on the second floor of the main building. This woman, Hadrian, is not one of the original colonists, but a researcher investigating the creature that killed them. She will explain that the creature is an incredibly deadly alien predator called a Terrormorph, that it is still in the facility, and that she needs a tissue sample from its corpse.

Hadrian sends you to the security center, located roughly in the middle of the facility, to try to reactivate the security system. Once you use the main computer to reset the system, she then directs you to the next room to activate a livestock tracking system in order to track the Terrormorph. Once you do, it will turn out that the Terrormorph is very close indeed, as it appears just on the far side of the security glass window and slaughters an unfortunate alien. It will now begin searching the facility for you.

Fighting the Terrormorph

The Terrormorph is a very dangerous enemy, especially for a low level character. It is fast, does considerable melee damage, and is highly resilient. Its only real weakness is its lack of a ranged attack. The tracking system will periodically tell you how close the Terrormorph is, beeping faster as it gets closer. Use stealth when the Terrormorph is close by if you're not yet prepared for a confrontation.
It may help if you have a sense of the facilities' layout. You can safely explore the whole area until you activate and tune the livestock tracking system.
If you move too far away from the facility the livestock tracking system will deactivate and you will have to reenable it. This will not interrupt or reset the fight, the Terrormorph will still be hunting you.

Activating the Kill Lanes

Hadrian recommends reactivating the facility's turrets, and these can be a powerful asset. There are three sets of turrets, each of which overlooks a path between two buildings, and requires you to activate two power generators. Once a set of turrets is activated, you can attempt to lure the Terrormorph into the "kill lane" beneath them using yourself as bait. The Terrormorph may also stumble into the turrets on its own, in which case you may be able to assist them from a distance by firing on it from the roof of a different building. Also, the turrets will fire whenever they have a line of fire to the Terrormorph, not just when it actually is inside the kill lanes.

You don't need to rush as there does not seem to be a timeout between hitting the power breakers. You can hit the power breakers in any order, even across kill lanes.
A quick way to activate all three kill lanes is:

1. After you watched the Terrormorph outside the red door labeled 'secure access' to your right opens and allows you to pass over from Security to Packaging. Go through it. Notice the collapsed roof to you left, but keep right. Go right and across the room, following the passage into the next room, turn right again and you are in front of the first power breaker.
2. Go back to the room where you came from. Go up the piece of collapsed roof in front of the door, cross the bridge in front of you, onto the roof of Quality Control, and head left. The second power breaker is between the green and orange structures, facing away from you.
3. Go back across the bridge you came over. Go past the hole in the ceiling to your left and jump down to the ground. Run past the alley to your left between Security and Preservation/Sanitation. Pass a big door to your left and a container to your right and you will see the third power breaker to your left.
4. Go right, ahead the way you came and across the trash. Go up the staircase at the edge of the building. At the top you will see a broken pipe and another staircase ahead. Go up there. The top of the staircase turn right. You see the fourth power breaker in front of you.
5. Go right and across the bridge to your left over to Dressing. Pass the yellow things on your right and you will see a staircase in front of you that leads down. Go down there. At the bottom turn left and you are in front of the fifth power breaker.
6. Turn right, go below the green pipes and turn left. Go across the bridge to Evisceration, and go around the structure to your left. Jump onto the lower part and you are in front of the sixth power breaker.

Once the Terrormorph is dead, loot its corpse to collect the tissue sample and return to Hadrian.

Analyzing the Threat

Hadrian will take the tissue sample to a research station on the ground floor, where she makes some initial observations, but is unable to find any sign of how or where the Terrormorph came from. She explains that Terrormorphs usually only appear on planets some seventy to onehundred years after human settlement, but Tau Ceti II has only been settled for twenty years, meaning that either someone deliberately transported this one, or that it's a new, rapidly-growing subspecies. Either way, it's a serious issue. She tells you to deliver the tissue same to Dr Percival Walker on Mars, and also gives you her genetag to confirm her identity to your commanding officer.

Return to Tuala. He will confirm that Hadrian is a former Xenowarfare expert who was discharged after the Colony War, and that he takes her concerns about the Terrormorphs very seriously, giving you permission to go look for Walker. If you havn't already finished or acuired Deep Cover he will also say that he has another, unrelated mission lined up for you, helping UC SysDef deal with the Crimson Fleet. You can either search for Walker to continue the UC Vanguard questline, or report to the UC Vigilance in orbit over Jemison to begin the SysDef/Crimson Fleet questline.

Companion Affinity

There is one affinity event that can happen during this mission.

Affinity	Stage	Andreja	Barrett	Sam Coe	Sarah Morgan
⏫︎ Loves (+50 Affinity)  ▲ Likes (+25 Affinity)  ▼ Dislikes (-15 Affinity)  ⏬︎ Hates (-35 Affinity)
The player and their companion have just killed the Terrormorph that wiped out a settlement on Tau Ceti. There are a variety of methods by which this could've happened, but anyone killing a Terrormorph on their own is a big deal.		▲	▲	▲	▲

Mission Stages

Grunt Work (UC02)
Stage	Finishes Mission	Mission Entry
1		(DEBUG: Jump the player to Cheif Herath)
2		(DEBUG: Jump the player to Tau Ceti II)
3		(DEBUG: Jump player to conversation with Hadrian)
4		(DEBUG: Jump to scanner sync)
5		(DEBUG: Lure testing)
6		(DEBUG: Terrormorph's dead. Go collect it's remains.)
7		(DEBUG: Hadrian finished at the scope and is ready to ask the player for help.)
19		(DEBUG: Stage to always set.)
50		(Player has encountered Hadrian and seen her Red Eyes)
100		(Quest started. Direct the player to Crew Chief Herath.) Commander Tuala directed me to speak to Crew Chief Herath at the New Atlantis spaceport in order to collect the materials I'll be delivering to Tau Ceti II.
105		(Player approached Herath and ship tech. Start scene (set from multi-actor trigger))
110		(Herath and ship tech scene complete.)
120		(Player started scene with Chief Herath. End the previous scene)
129		(DEBUG - Throw the message informing the player they're getting nothing for the moment..)
150		(Player hit Herath's question loop. Unlock new intro line for that scene.)
200		(Player finished scene with Herath. Direct them to Tau Ceti II.) I've spoken to Crew Chief Herath and have acquired Tau Ceti II's repair materials. I should head there to drop them off as soon as possible.
210		(P3.75: Player arrived on Tau Ceti. Get the weather override going.)
250		(Player got close enough to trigger the explosion.) I just heard a very inhuman scream from the factory nearby. I should see what happened.
300		(Player approached Hadrian's building. Play her attract scene.) There's someone alive in one of the factory buildings! She says I should meet her on the second floor of the main building.
301		(Player approached from the rear. Have Hadrian's alt-scene play.) Someone in one of the factory buildings just contacted me on my radio. They told me to meet them in the building with the large "Tau" sign on it.
302		(Hadrian's attract scene has finished. Get her back inside the building (used to change the condition on her package))
310		(Player approach Hadrian's inner trigger.)
400		(Player started Hadrian's main scene (Set from the start up of the scene))
401		(Player said their a shocktrooper in Hadrian's intro scene.)
402		(Player said they're a capable soldier in Hadrian's intro scene)
403		(Player hit first loop for Hadrian's intro scene.)
404		(Player asked about Hadrian's wound. This is used to change up the player dialogue text in Hadrian's intro scene first loop.)
405		(Player asked Hadrian what a Terrormorph is. This unlocks a new dialogue option to ask Hadrian)
406		(Player asked about "grim history" (which obliquely references Londinion). This is used to change up a line later in Wrap-Up scene to reference the player asked about this earlier.)
407		(Player heard that Hadrian was head of the UC Xenowarfare unit)
410		(Player reached Hadrian's question scene. Have that become the scene they return to.)
412		(P3.5: Player informed Hadrian they killed the Terrormorph early. Close off that scene and turn on the custom line for her in the next one.)
415		(Player asked about the fuel tanks in Hadrian's question scene. She'll tell them to grant her remote access to the terminal.)
420		(Player asked about the security system in Hadrian's question scene.)
422		(Player hit either stage 415 or 420, so knows Hadrian wants access to the security hub. Unlocks the "grant remote access" entry in that terminal)
425		(Player hit the Sarah/Hadrian back n' forth in the questions scene. This is used to shut it off.)
430		(Player selected the "I'm not here for this" option in Hadrian's question scene. Unlock a new option allowing them to walk away.)
440		(Hadrian learned the player's Vanguard)
500		(Scene with Hadrian wrapped. Direct the player out into the facility.) I met Hadrian, a former UC researcher brought here by the rumor of an anomalous Terrormorph. She asked me to head to the nearby security outpost and reset her connection to it so she can try and get the facility's defenses back online.
510		(Player got an apology from Hadrian about the pumps. This is used to turn off other variants of that line.)
550		(Player spotted the Terrormorph. Used to unlock dialogue for Lt. Tuala back on New Atlantis and display the "Kill Terrormorph" obj if they've spoke to Hadrian)
599		(Stage to set once we want the player to kill the Terrormorph. Displayed the objective if the player:1. Sees the Terrormorph2. Reaches primes the pumps)
600		(Player granted Hadrian remote access to the security terminal)
601		(Hadrian reached the "re-arm the turrets" section of her radio scene. Set up that objective) I tuned the livestock tracking system to 183.5, but it got the attention of the Terrormorph, which is now on the move. Hadrian suggested I try not to fight it, and instead power up the facility's turrets by throwing the breakers on each building.
603		(DEBUG: Player activated the Tracking Terminal. Throw a message box for them and progress the quest.)
605		(Hadrian directs the player to throw the primer.) I've granted Hadrian remote access to the security hub. She discovered a system I can use to track the Terrormorph around the facility. First, though, I need to tune the system to the right frequency - 183.5.
606		(P4+: The critter murder sequence has begun. Plunk the Terrormorph in the "friend" faction for the remainder of the sequence)
607		(Player threw primer switch.)
608		(Get the Terrormorph moving towards its kill target)
609		(P4+: The morph's anim sequence has completed. Unlock his patrol ability)
610		(Hadrian armed the livestock tracking system for the player.)
611		(P4+: Kill the Reveal Critter)
612		(P4.5+: Unlocking the security room doors)
615		(Player primed the fuel tanks in the security hub. They can now use the lures (enable their activation as well.))
620		(Player tuned the livestock tracker to 185.3)
630		(Used to unlock the Terrormorph from its "hold" package and display the "Kill the terrormorph" obj. Kicks off if it goes into combat (triggered on the alias) or the player activates their first lure)
650		(All defenses back online. Complete that objective.) All the turrets are back online, which should make killing the Terrormorph that much easier... I hope.
655		(Player destroyed or activated the objective fuel tank)
660		(Player detonated at least one of the fuel tanks. Used to modify Hadrian's dialogue)
700		(Terrormorph is dead. Play Hadrian's scene) I killed the Terrormorph! I should collect that sample Hadrian was asking for.
701		(Terrormorph was killed within Hadrian's line of sight and she said her shout line (used to condition the first line of "Return to Hadrian" scene))
702		(P4+: Hadrian hit the Terrormorph at some point. Used to change up her dialogue. Set from the Morph's alias.)
703		(Player hit the "hand over the section of Hadrian's scene)
705		(Player collected the tissue sample. If they've previously spoken to Hadrian, direct them back there now.) I collected the tissue sample for Hadrian. Now I just need to return it to her back at the main building.
710		(Hadrian finished her "You killed the Morph" scene. Get her trekking to its corpse.)
719		(Hadrian was unable to reach the Terrormorph. Go into failsafe mode.)
720		(Hadrian arrived at the Terrormorph. Her scene can now play)
722		(Move the scan furniture to Hadrian and have her get in it.)
725		(Hadrian started collecting her sample. Turns off her hellos.)
740		(Player handed over Terrormorph sample to Hadrian.) I gave Hadrian the tissue sample. She's asked me to accompany her so we can start getting some answers on this thing.
750		(Hadrian finished with her sample. Direct the player to speak with her.) Hadrian's finished analyzing the sample, and seems... concerned. I should find out what she uncovered.
751		(P3: Player hit the 1st loop in Hadrian's wrap up scene. Get 'em back there.)
752		(P3: Hadrian told the player about Londinion. Unlocks dialogue options in UC03.)
753		(Player hit the middle of Hadrian's wrap-up scene. Get them back to that point if they drop out.)
755		(Player nixed Hadrian's request to come with her.)
760		(Player asked Hadrian for money. Used to change up a line in her final scene.)
770		(Have Hadrian give the player her genetag in her final scene.)
800		(Hadrian directed the player back to New Atlantis to go check in with Lt. Tuala.) Hadrian's asked that I get permission from my commander to take this tissue sample to Percival Walker on Mars. I need to return to Commander Tuala in New Atlantis and see what he says.
801		(P3: Player arrived on New Atlantis. Turn off Hadrian back on Tau Ceti)
805		(PASS 2.5: Player hit Tuala's first loop in the permission scene. Get them back there.)
806		(P3: Player dropped out of scene after reaching the player choice about Hadrian. Get them back to that point.)
807		(PASS 2.5: Player hit final loop in Tuala permission scene. Get the player back there.)
810		(PASS 2.5: Player asked Tuala if they know Hadrian. Unlocks a new dialogue option in that section.)
850		(Player handed over Hadrian's genetag to Tuala)
860		(P2.75: STG: TUALA WRAP-UP: Start Crimson Fleet questline.)

Notes

• Any text displayed in angle brackets (e.g., <Alias=LocationHold>) is dynamically set by the Radiant Mission system, and will be filled in with the appropriate word(s) when seen in game.
• Not all entries may appear in your log; which entries appear and which entries do not depends on the manner in which the mission is done.
• Stages are not always in order of progress. This is usually the case with missions that have multiple possible outcomes or missions where certain tasks may be done in any order. Some stages may therefore repeat objectives seen in other stages.
• If an entry is marked as "Finishes Mission" it means the mission disappears from the Active Mission list, but you may still receive new entries for that mission.
• On the PC, it is possible to use the console to advance through the mission by entering setstage UC02 stage, where stage is the number of the stage you wish to complete. It is not possible to un-complete (i.e. go back) mission stages, but it is possible to clear all stages of the mission using resetquest UC02.