Alchemy and Refinery ships

There are three classes of alchemy ships: the Neutronic Refinery Ship, the Merlin Class Alchemy Ship and the Aries Class Transport.
The use of alchemy ships can be disabled by the host.

Merlin Class Alchemy Ship
The Merlin Class Alchemy Ship can convert supply units into minerals. The basic chemical reaction is that three supply units can be converted to one mineral. In general usage, the Merlin converts nine supply units into three minerals. These are divided equally; nine supply units are turned into one of each mineral.

Chemical reaction:
Normally, the Merlin converts nine supply units into one of each mineral. This means nine units of supplies yield 1 KT of Duranium, 1 KT Tritanium and 1 KT molybdenum. The ship will continue to convert the supplies to minerals as long as there are at least 9 supplies onboard.

To transform minerals, just load the ship with supplies and wait till next turn. The supplies will be turned into minerals automatically. The Merlin does not need to have fuel onboard for the alchemy function to work, and no mission needs to be set.

Controlling the alchemy function
Some special friendly codes control the alchemy function of the Merlin:

• "ald" - Alchemy Duranium. This code will cause an alchemy ship to produce only Duranium.
• "alt"  - Alchemy Tritanium. This code will cause an alchemy ship to produce only Tritanium.
• "alm" - Alchemy Molybdenum. This code will cause an alchemy ship to produce only molybdenum.

When using these codes, three supplies units will be turned into one kiloton of the desired mineral. In this case the ship will continue to work as long as there are at least 3 supplies on board

The alchemy function of a Merlin Class ship can be disabled with a friendly code of "NAL" ( No ALchemy )

Neutronic Refinery Ship
The Neutronic Refinery Ship can convert minerals plus supplies to neutronic fuel (neutronium).

Chemical reactions:
There are three alchemy reactions that a refinery ship can use:

• 1 Duranium + 1 supply unit ---> 1 neutronium
• 1 molybdenum + 1 supply unit ---> 1 neutronium
• 1 Tritanium + 1 supply unit ---> 1 neutronium

The neutronic refinery ship will automatically perform the refinery function if all three of the following conditions are met. The ship will continue to refine fuel until one or more of the conditions are no longer met.

1. There is at least one kiloton of Duranium, molybdenum or Tritanium on board the ship.
2. There is at least one supply unit on board the ship.
3. There is at least room for one kiloton of fuel in the fuel tank.

To refine fuel, make sure the fueltank of the ship is not full and load any mixture of supplies and minerals onboard. The most straightforward mixture is a number of supply units and a total number of minerals which is equal to the amount of supplies (e.g. 100 supplies, 40 Tritanium, 40 Duranium and 20 molybdenum or simply 100 supplies and 100 Tritanium).The next turn the supplies and minerals will be transferred into fuel and stored in the refinery ship's fuel tank. A common practice is to refine a type of minerals you have in abundance (often Duranium) into fuel.

The alchemy function of a Neutronic Refinery Ship can be disabled with a friendly code of "NAL" ( No ALchemy )

Aries Class Transport
The Aries Class Transport is an advanced alchemy starship. The Aries will convert minerals into Neutronium, without the use of supplies. It will do this at a rate of one unit of fuel per unit of any other mineral that is placed in the starship's cargo holds. So if one unit of Tritanium is loaded onto this starship it will be converted into one unit of fuel. This process requires neither supplies nor megacredits to be performed. As long as there is room for more fuel in the Aries' fueltank, any minerals onboard the ship will be converted to fuel until it's tanks are full or until it runs out of minerals.

The alchemy function of an Aries Class Transport can not be disabled. The only way to "disable" it's alchemy function is to make sure the fueltank is already full so it cannot convert minerals to fuel.

The Aries Class Transport does not work if the player has a shareware version of the game.