Reverse Engineering's a bit of a complex process, one that tends to raise a lot of questions here, and while most of this information can be found in any shipwright FAQ and elsewhere on internet, this guide try to collect enough info for pilots or for a experimented SW. I am trying to merge and summarize all my shipwright, pilot and looting experience.

1.- Space Reverse Engineering definition.

Reverse Engineering (REing) is a process wich combine multiple loot components to create a single, but superior component. To RE an item, you'll need:

• First a number of components equal to their RE level: so 6 level 6 engines, 4 level 4 capacitors, 10 level 10 blasters, etc. There are some rare exceptions to this explained in the next paragraph.
• Second a Ship analisys component tool (if you are a Shipwright), or a Shipwright.

There are a number of loot items whose certification level differs from their RE level. Becasu of that the SW must be sure that, when assembling the parts, he is sure all the RE levels match. Some Notable items where the cert and RE levels differ, for example, a level 10 capacitor with RE level 5. There are plenty of others.).

In any case and for looting purposes the only thing that matters is that the RE level of each part is the same.

2.- The RE process under Shipwrights point of view.

2.1.- Shipwrights: Skills And Tools Needed To RE

Most of players don't need to worry about how to physically combine the parts, but a good pilot may know quite well this process in oder to understand how to drive his loot runs, but if you're a shipwright, the process is simple: build a Component Analysis Tool, drop the parts you wish to RE into the tool, and select the Analyze Component option from the radial menu. Resource quality won't matter in the REing results, all it does is give you more charges on the tool.

Master shipwright (Master Structure Trader after NGE) can RE any looted ship part but Novice Structures Trader can only RE level 1 components. Master shipwright gives +1 to all REing stats, for a total of +10 to all components, allowing you to RE up through the highest level of loot available in the game.

Shipwright skills won't affect the outcome in any way, all they do is determine how high a level of loot you can RE. A novice shipwright will RE the level 1 parts he can handle every bit as well as a master, with the exception, maybe, about the previous experience in this process.

2.2.- Reed parts vs Crafted: An Example Of An RE Job

The RE process have three great advantages:
a) When combining the parts, the best stat from each category will be used in the final product. With carefully selected loot, this can result in some remarkable components.
b) In many cases the global part stats will be better, in average, than most of the crafted parts. This is because during the crafting process a Shipwright can only concentrate his experimentation bonuses in certain stats but the RE process can combine rare and really good stats from the parts used in the process.
c) The Shipwright has absolute control over the process and this not depends of facts such us:
- the quality of the resources and its plannetary availability.
- The experimentation points,
- Buffs, clothes and other complements.
- Lucky during experimentation (The experiment can be a failure, a great or an amazing success).

In opposite, the RE process has another three serious inconveniences, of course:

a) The looting average time can be, and usually is, really long and hard . If you are thinking on a quick or easy looting process, the RE is not your way.
b) Good parts for RE availability in market is close to zero or extremelly expensive. Everybody keep the level 6 to 10 ship parts for them or ofr their own projects (Junk included).
c) Certain parts (like level 8 weapons, level 10 engines or RTZ reactors) have a very low drop rate.

Consequently, be ready for a hard job if you loot by yourself, take your time and you will get a superuberstuffed vessel ready for combat.

The next paragraphs will show an example of an simple and easy RE process, step bu step

Step 1: you have the ready parts for the process.
Let's say you have looted and you're REing 3 level 3 nice reactors, such us Rea1, Rea2 and Rea3 with the following stats:

Reactor 1 Reactor 2, Reactor 3,
Armor 171.4 172.9 177.38
HP 171.4 172.9 177.38
Energy 13079.0 10230.0 12597.0
Mass 3160.6 3350.2 2605.80

Once u execute the process, the end product will take the best available stat from the RE'd components, so here it will use the mass (2605.80), Armor and HP (177.38) from Rea• and energy (13079.0) from Rea1 as the basis for a final product, ignoring in the proccess the Rea2 which is usefull as filled in this project:

To end the process, just choose a name for ur final product and That is.

You finally have RE’ed your first part, and the output should be as follows ( a nice and medium to high energy generation rate reactor with a very low mass):

This could be a good reactor for a JSF or RGI

2.3.- REing Bonuses

These stats are not yet accurate, however, as REing also adds a percentage-based bonus to the final product which will boost each stat by a number determined by the RE level of the components. This bonus is as follows:

Level 1 components: +1%
2-3: 2%
4-5: 3%
6-7: 4%
8-9: 5%
10: 6%

The REing bonus will always improve a stat as appropriate--i.e., it will decrease mass by the given percent, increase damage, increase recharge rates, decrease command times on droid interfaces, etc. (The one exception to this is that the reactor drain stat doesn't get the % bonus. It will give you the lowest drain among the assembled parts, and then claim to decrease it by the given %, but I've tested this out and it's a bug in the system. UPDATE: This bug has been fixed as of publish 24.) So, in the example above, Capacitor C's final stats will be as follows:

Mass: 1176 (1200*0.98)
Reactor Drain: 784 (800*0.98)
Recharge Rate: 35.7 (35*1.02)
Stored Energy: 918 (900*1.02)

(You'll note the formula for stats that see their numbers reduced--mass, energy drain, droid command speed, refire, etc.--goes as follows: "best stat*(100% - bonus %)" This is slightly different from how I had it listed earlier.)

The bonuses on a level 2 item may seem slight, but once you're REing high-level stuff, it will really start to add up for some significant additions to your components.

This is the underlying theory of REing and the bare essentials of what a pilot would need to know. The next post will get into more specifics and complex situations which could be valuable for any serious REer, shipwright or pilot.
Message Edited by TomoRainer on 10-23-2005 02:25 AM

2.4.- Naming Your Components:

REing gives you the option to name your final product as you see fit. After you run the analysis, two windows will pop up. The first will show you the final stats and % bonuses. The second will let you enter a permanent name for the new item. You don't have to name the item; if you just hit okay, it will default the name to that of the first item put into the tool. (More on this in the next segment.) This one screen is your only chance to name your item.

However, there is a naming filter that will reject certain characters and words. It would be difficult to find or list everything that's disallowed, but I do know it will not let you use Arabic numerals (1, 2, 8, etc--but Roman numerals are fine), quotation marks, or the names of the games' component manufacturers (Sienar, MandalMotors, etc). It's a good bet profanity won't be let through, though I admittedly haven't tried, and I know that at least some other key Star Wars terms (such as Interceptor, probably things like Jabba and Vader as well) aren't allowed, along with whatever other seemingly arbitrary subjects it's been decided to block. If your name has anything the filter doesn't like, it will be rejected and your component will be given the name of the first item in the tool with no chance to try a second name. UPDATE: This was changed a few publishes ago. You should now be able to try another name if your first one is rejected by the naming filter.

Some pilots and, if you run a big REing business, yourself, may be interested in insuring they get the name they want. If so, here's a trick taught me by Adonis of Starsider: get a level 1 item, RE it, and attempt to give it the name you want for your special component. If it lets the name go through, great, you can use it on that pre-nerf engine or level 10 blaster; if it rejects it, get another level 1 item and try another name. Repeat until you get an acceptable result, then apply it to the item you care about.

2.5.- Appearance And Weapon Effects:

The main draw of REing is to improve the stats on an item, but you can also use it to change the item's appearance on your ship. Boosters and engines have two different appearances, and when it comes to weapons, there are a dozen or more different looks, both for the weapon itself and for the projectile it fires. When REing, you can influence the appearance of the final product.

This requires knowing what each loot component looks like when placed in or fired from your ship. With boosters, engines, and the physical weapon, this can be done by loading them into your ship and seeing how it looks on the manage screen. With weapon effects--what kind of projectile it fires--you'll have to load in the weapon, launch into space, and fire it a few times to see what comes out.

Once you've done this, it's relatively simple to choose from among all the available graphics: all you have to do is put the item whose graphic you wish to preserve in the tool first. If that QV-5 Disruptor that fires the blue lasers is the effect you want, for instance, make sure the first thing you put in the analyzer is that QV-5.

It's a good idea to have the analyzer tool's window open when you're dragging components inside. Depending on how you have your UI set up, it can be reorganized if the window's closed, and as such the component you put in first may not stay first. If you keep the tool window open at all times, you can insure the first item stays put and gives you the effect you're going for.

Adonis and I have compiled a fairly comprehensive list of loot weapons and their effects. I'll include a link to it in the final post in this series.

2.6.- Re-Reverse Engineering:

An item may only be RE'd once. After you've RE'd it, it will lose its RE level, preventing you from attempting to do so again.

2.7.- When Certification And RE Levels Differ:

The certification level of the first component in the tool will be used to determine the final product's cert level. Thanks to Sar-larid for the confirmation. As he notes, you're probably going to want to use the lowest-level cert item for this, as I can't think of a case where you'd want to restrict yourself from using an item at the lowest possible level.

2.8.- How to get KSE Firespray Disks:

For some shipwrights, these are the big draw of REing. Personally I think Firesprays are a major hassle, and as a long-time smuggler I've had a lifetime's worth of experience with apparently random systems and the deviously intricate systems clever players try to impose on them, but much as I'd like to leave out this discussion, I can't neglect it and expect to have a full REing guide.

To get a KSE Firespray, you need a Firespray schematic. To get a Firespray schematic, you need 8 different disk fragments. To get a disk fragment, you need to RE like crazy. It's a random drop and a disk seems to appear from roughly every 100-300 RE jobs, and from what I've gathered, that doesn't mean the number of items input to be RE'd, but the total number output from it--which is to say that you'll need to have 100-300 RE'd components sitting in your inventory before you're likely to have a disk.

Is that to say that you're just as likely to get a disk from REing a level 1 item as you are REing a set of level 10s? Yeah, I think so. But I'm not sure and I don't care quite enough for the massive research that would require. Another theory states that having Kuat parts in your RE jobs increases the chance of a disk drop. I doubt this, but if you happen to think it's true, don't let me dissuade you from testing it out, I don't have much proof besides personal experience and Occam's Razor, and the knowledge you'd provide the community would be much welcomed. It may well be there are hidden patterns to the system that are worth investigating. But these things would take thousands of carefully recorded experiments to provide evidence either way, so until someone does that (or a dev confirms it), I figure it's still up in the air--but safest to assume it's completely random.

Once you have all 8 disks (numbers 1-8--and there seems to be some strange system whereby a given player, or possibly server, gets more of one disk than another; I've had like 15 disks, for instance, and 4 of them have been #5, and I've read about similar cases with other people, but on the other hand the sample size is so small it's hard to tell, and we're right back into arguments akin to the randomness of slicing--but I digress)--once you have all 8 disks, you stick them in your RE tool and analyze away. This will give you a limited-use Firespray schematic, with between 3-6 uses at random. At 50% experimentation, a Firespray will have 210K mass; you might want to shoot for 211.5-213K.

When you get a disk, you'll see a system message right after you hit the "Analyze" option. It'll say "You found an odd item inside one of the components!"

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