WALKING vs RUNNING
After participating in several debates on this subject and spending countless hours planet side, I have come to the conclusion that the survivalist should maintain a steady and deliberate walk. One should only run in situations of immediate danger or when there is an over abundance of Thamium9. Running depletes life support at twice the rate of walking but does not cover twice the distance over an equal amount of time. Also standard Life Support systems do not replenish themselves under any conditions the way shields or hazard protections do. Therefore Life Support requires a constant input of raw materials to maintain it.
The materials used to replenish life support are Thamium9 or various Power Containers such as Power Gel, Power Canister and, Power Reservoir. These crafted power containers require the core materials of Plutonium and Carbon. At first glance one might be inclined to run and jet pack about knowing that they can craft power canisters at any time. After all the lowest level craftable item, Power Gel, requires only 50 Plutonium and 100 Carbon to make and will restore 50% of Life Support capacity. Plutonium however is a versatile resource and the adept survivalist will realize that its power is best used in other technologies. Launch Thrusters on all survivalist ships require 200 units of Plutonium to achieve take-off velocity and all Multi Tool technologies can be refueled with this high energy material.
The best conservation strategy is to use Thamium9 for life support and avoid using the more versatile plutonium for crafting power containers if possible. Thamium9 can only replenish a small subset of a available technologies compared to Plutonium and is the only raw material that can be used to replenish Life Support. 1 Unit of Thamium9 will replenish 2% of life support function and the base craftable item Power Gel will replenish 50% of life support function. That means 50 units of Plutonium is equivalent to 25 units of Thamium9 when replenishing life support.
If as a survivalist you are conserving Life Support by walking you will experience increased hazard exposure. This is the most common argument used when advocating for running over walking. However, proper maintenance of Hazard Protection can be much more efficient than maintaining Life Support and provides the survivalist with many more mitigation options. The first thing to remember is that standard Exosuit Hazard Protection self heals when removed from exposure conditions. This means that even if one can not find the materials to craft shield replenishment or base oxide elements such as zinc, they can still replenish Hazard Protection by finding or making shelter. The list of craftable Shielding items that can replenish Hazard Protection systems are Shielding Shards, Shielding Plates and, Shielding Sheets. The basic shielding shard costs a mere 20 Platinum plus 50 Iron and will restore 50% of Hazard Protection function. A common strategy is to use natural shelter when possible to allow Hazard protection to self heal and use Shielding to replenish Hazard protection when no shelter can be easily found. Using a mix of shelter and replenishment while walking will guarantee that when you reach shelter you will have enough Life Support to sit still and let your Hazard Protection self heal.
May Atlas Guide You,
reachingnexus