Science lab
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Science labs are mysterious, expansive underground facilities. To gain access, you'll need to either unlock the id reader with a science id card or electrohack, or break through with explosives or tools such as a jackhammer or pickaxe.
Labs are composed of multiple underground levels of rectangular rooms that are laid out in a rough grid pattern. Each block of rooms corresponds to one map tile, and the transition between them always has double doors. Ordinary rooms of the lab include:
- Closet with cleaning supplies (ammonia, bleach, mops).
- Counter and computer, which can be hacked to access research logs and download map of the nearby surface. Beware that a turret almost always spawns on the counters; be careful when opening doors in illuminated walls.
- Chemistry workroom; usually it's mundane (for a secret government lab, at least) and has assorted chemicals and chemistry gear, but there's a 1 in 3 chance it'll be a mutagen workroom, where mutagens, mutagenic serums, purifiers, and mutagen recipe books can spawn.
- Teleportation lab: work-counter in the middle and a teleporter somewhere on the floor.
- Room filled with pits of goo. There is always a refrigerator in the corner, which can contain odd things including riot helmets and lighters.
- Common bionics storage; access to both storages is controlled by a linked computer pair and hacking one will unlock the other.
- Cloning vats filled with bodyparts (mutated arm, mutated leg, misshapen fetus).
- Vivisection lab containing a dissection machine.
- Dormitory, containing beds and dressers. Researchers have been known to have recreational gear and/or reading material here.
- Rooms containing research subjects in concrete and reinforced glass cells. A central computer outside the cell section can be hacked to purge the specimens in all cells.
- A data analyser which can be used to analyse black boxes.
Additionally there are rooms that are locked behind computer controlled metal doors:
- Barracks and armoury; the armoury is not accessible via the barracks. To gain access to the armoury, you must either drop down from the level above using stairs or a hole or break through with explosives or tools such as a jackhammer or pickaxe.
- Prisoner containment and containment cells.
The lowest floor of a lab contains a finale with a special room:
- Weapons testing facility with energy weapons, mininukes, cutting-edge Rivtech armor, or just random guns.
- Netherworld access facility with trapped sub-prime monsters and Resonance Cascade activation terminal.
- Rare bionics storage.
- CVD Machine.
Enemy encounters in labs are relatively uncommon, although stronger, more powerful enemies can be found, including:
- Robotic security such as manhacks, Security bots, turrets, and skitterbots.
- Previous researchers such as zombie scientists and zombies.
- Test subjects such as zombie brutes, broken cyborgs, grabber zombies, zombie children and nether creatures such as mi-gos, grackens and krecks.
- Previous security, often found in barracks and finales, such as zombie soldiers, zombie bio-operators and armored zombies.
Notes
Navigating labs and remaining orientated can be difficult. Remember that ordinary lab tiles are a light blue, while tiles containing stairs down to the next level appear in a darker blue.
It may be helpful to place notes on each map tile with a different symbol corresponding to each general layout, to make the map more readable and keep yourself oriented. Another strategy is to place notes on map tiles which do not contain rooms, to keep track of where you have left to explore. There will always be a set of double doors in the center of the wall between adjacent blocks, so the absence of such doors is enough to infer the absence of any rooms there.
On map-gen, there is a chance that a lab will become an ice lab. Ice labs are characterized by having a lower ambient temperature immediately on entry, that also decreases significantly with lower levels. Full winter survivor gear, thermal electric gear and/or Internal Climate Control are required to explore the lowest levels of these labs. Additionally, ice labs make great cellars as the low temperatures fully prevent food spoilage.
See also:
