the wonderful limpets and thier controllers

Limpets are essentially little drones that you can deploy to do a variety of tasks. The task they complete depends on the controller that you have installed in your ship. The ones we focus on are prospector and collection limpets.

You can purchase limpets at stations in the advanced maintenance section. They are listed in the resupply ammo tab

Alternatively, you can now craft limpets in your ship while flying. They are under the synthesis section

Prospector limpets can be useful, but i would only reccomend these for mining ships that have large amounts of cargo space (200 tons or more).

When used, it shoots a limpet straight in front of the ship. When it hits an asteroid, it latches on. Targeting that limpet will then display the makeup of that asteroid, and how much of its ore is left.

Prospector limpets significantly increase the amount of chunks an asteroid drops

Prospectors are one-offs, so you will go through your limpets very fast. This is why i reccomend them for large ships that can carry a large amount of limpets. However, considering they boost the amount of ore you get from an asteroid they can be extremely useful.

The different tiers of controllers dictate how many prospecting limpets can be active at one time, how far away they can be and how long they last.

Collector Limpets do as the name implies, they collect stuff and return it to your ship. They have 2 modes; Target Retrieve mode and Search & Return mode. This controller is the best for mining, as it saves you from chasing down every little piece of ore you break off.

Target Retrieve mode is activated by targeting a chunk or container and then launching a collector. The collector whill travel to the target, pick it up, and then return it to your ship. Once it places it in your cargo, the limpet self-destructs.

Search & Return Mode is the default mode of collectors. Make sure you have no container or chunk targeted and launch a collector limpet. The limpet will fly around looking for chunks or containers to pick up. It will automatically target the closest one. It will collect it, return to the ship, deposit the container or chunk, then return to searching. This mode is the most useful for mining.

The different tiers of controllers dictate how many collectors can be active at once, the max distance from the ship they can go and how long they remain active in the Search & Return mode.