Tier 1-2 Buildings: Stories
Tier 1-2 buildings are where salvage becomes useful. These are the first steps from scavenging to producing—the foundation of any operation.
Tier 1: Processors
E-Waste Processor
What It Looks Like
A squat metal building with conveyor feeds, sorting chambers, and output chutes. Inside: grinding machinery, chemical baths, and robotic arms that haven't stopped moving since installation.
"An E-Waste Processor is a mechanical stomach. You feed it anything electronic and it digests it into useful parts. The first one I built, I made from an old industrial recycler—one of ORACLE's models that still worked if you knew how to talk to it."
The First Processor
ORACLE designed the original E-Waste Processors to maintain zero-waste manufacturing. Every device that reached end-of-life was processed back into materials for new devices. After the Cascade, surviving processors became the foundation of salvage economy. Building one now means recreating ORACLE's design from surviving examples.
The Sound
Constant grinding, punctuated by sorting mechanisms. The rhythm of destruction and creation. Workers say you can tell what's being processed by the sound—hard metal has a different grind than circuit board.
Scrap Sorter
What It Looks Like
Open-air facility with multiple conveyor lines, magnetic separators, density sorters, and human inspection stations. Material flows in as chaos, exits as organized streams.
"Sorting is the oldest job in salvage. Before machines, people did it by hand—still do, in the Dregs. A good Scrap Sorter is just automated instinct, knowing what's valuable and what's not."
Why It Matters
Mixed scrap is almost worthless. Sorted scrap has market value. The Sorter is the difference between digging through trash and operating a supply chain.
Power Cell Extractor
What It Looks Like
A reinforced building (explosions happen) with precision robotic systems, chemical treatment chambers, and heavily shielded storage. Safety warnings everywhere.
"Power Cells are concentrated energy. Concentrated energy, mishandled, means fire, explosion, toxic release. The Extractor's job is to make dangerous things safe—and to do it fast enough to be profitable."
The Risk
Every operator knows someone who lost a cell extraction facility to a bad cell. The old ORACLE cells are safest—designed to fail gracefully. The post-Cascade knock-offs are what you have to worry about.
Data Scavenger
What It Looks Like
Climate-controlled clean room. Racks of interface equipment. Screens showing recovery progress. Very quiet—data work requires concentration.
"Most salvaged storage is corrupted. Bad sectors, failed encryption, bit rot. The Scavenger's job is to find the good parts and pull them out without destroying the rest. It's surgery, not mining."
What You Find
Mostly mundane: financial records, personal files, system logs. Occasionally valuable: technical documentation, encryption keys, ORACLE fragments. Rarely: something that changes everything.
Tier 2: Component Fabricators
Component Assembler
What It Looks Like
Precision manufacturing floor. Robotic assembly arms. Quality control stations. The first facility that builds rather than breaks.
"Assembly is where you stop being a scavenger and start being a producer. Anyone can break things down. Building them up takes understanding."
The Threshold
Building a Component Assembler is a milestone. It means you've moved from salvage economy to manufacturing economy. You're not just processing the past—you're creating the future.
Logic Board Fabricator
What It Looks Like
Clean room with chemical etching stations, pick-and-place machines, testing rigs. The air smells like solder and potential.
"A Logic Board is thought made physical. Every trace is a path for decisions. Every component is a piece of reasoning. When you fabricate a board, you're building a simple mind."
The ORACLE Shadow
Pre-Cascade logic boards were standardized, interchangeable, perfect. Post-Cascade boards are hand-designed, idiosyncratic, functional but not elegant. Every fabricator carries the echo of lost standards.
Servo Motor Factory
What It Looks Like
Heavy industrial facility. Winding machines for coils. Magnetization chambers. Testing stations where motors spin endlessly, proving they work.
"Everything that moves, moves because of motors. Robots, vehicles, assembly lines, opening doors—all motors. A Servo Factory is where you build the ability to act."
The Craft
Good motors are art. The winding pattern, the magnet alignment, the bearing fit—small differences make huge impacts on efficiency and lifespan. Factory workers develop instincts for what makes a motor excellent.
Neural Chip Foundry
What It Looks Like
Ultra-clean fabrication facility. Microscopic precision. Quantum-level processes. More sensor than building—everything measured, everything controlled.
"A neural chip isn't like other electronics. It's not designed to follow instructions—it's designed to develop instructions. Every chip that leaves the foundry has the potential to think."
The Weight
Workers at Neural Chip Foundries often report feeling... watched. Not by surveillance—by the chips themselves. Probably imagination. Probably.
The Progression Story
From Salvage to Creation
The arc from Tier 0 resources through Tier 1-2 buildings tells a story:
Tier 0 (Resources)
The world is broken. You're picking through remains.
Tier 1 (Processors)
You're learning to extract value from wreckage.
Tier 2 (Fabricators)
You're creating new things from old materials.
Each step represents growing capability and understanding. The player isn't just collecting—they're building a production ecosystem.
What It Feels Like
Early Processor
"I built my first E-Waste Processor from instructions I found on a dead data drive. Three weeks to assemble, another week to calibrate. When it finally ran without catching fire, I cried. I was making things now. I wasn't just surviving—I was building."
First Fabricator
"The day my Logic Board Fabricator produced its first working board, I held it up to the light and watched the traces shine. I made that. From salvage and knowledge and patience. It wasn't scavenged—it was created. That's when I knew I could do anything."
The Human Element
Even automated facilities have human stories: Who designed the process? What does operating it feel like? What can go wrong? What makes a good one versus a great one?
These buildings connect to transcendence: Processing = learning to see value in broken things. Fabrication = learning to create from destruction. The progression mirrors the player's own transformation.
Every building is a step in a journey—not just a production node, but a place with atmosphere, a milestone that meant something when achieved, part of a larger story about transformation.