UrielFromSky's Improved Xenoarch Guide (For Larges, Mostly)

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*1. The Preparation*
*2. Actually Being a Xenoarchaeologist*
*3. Understanding Larges*
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*INTRODUCTION*
Welcome to Johnny Johanesson's (UrielFromSky) Guide to Xenoarchaeology. Xenoarch is often an ignored and misunderstood job, so I'll do my best to try to explain it on simple terms that most people can understand. With the introduction out of the way, let's begin.
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*1. The Preparation*
First of all, if research is not done, do research. This will be handy later on, as you will see later on the guide. The wiki has a pretty good guide on research, so I recommend you to go there and use the Robotics Syringe Gun method, since that one is way more efficient and fast, page in point: https://ss13.moe/wiki/index.php/Guide_to_Research_and_Development#Method_2:_The_Robotics_Kickstart:_Research_For_Robots (Basically, with this method, you go to robotics and produce three syringe guns in the fabricator, which greatly speeds up research)
When research is done, print a mining drill and an excavation drill. Those are more efficient than the pickaxe and handpick, respectively. Also grab a first aid kit (any kind works, oxygen ones are common on suffocation lockers) so you can put hyperzine pills on them. Now, go to the outpost if you're on an outpost map, or go to the north-east part of the station if you're on Roid. Now, get the hardsuit, magboots and an oxygen tank from the suit storage and tank dispenser, then from xenoarch gear get a 1cm brush from the pickset (for strange rocks and brushing large artifact debris), a depth analyser scanner (for smalls, knowing which debris has a large, and for recognizing carbon digsites), a measuring tape (those are technically not necessary and won't be used too much, but they're nice to have), mesons (for observing digsites outside normal view) and if you want, the GPS is useful too. Put the excavation belt in your belt slot, and put all those tools and your excavation and mining drill on there. (OPTIONAL) Go to the chemistry area of the xenoarch wing and prepare hyperzine, and make them on pills lower than 15u so you don't overdose (90 units and 7 pills is good enough), insert the hyperzine pills on the first aid kit that you have, and swallow one. After swallowing the pill, proceed to activate your magboots so that you don't get ZASed.com, activate your mesons too and remember to activate internals.

Now, you may go outside and begin looking for digsites, your priority right now is trying to find ANY digsite (even carbon) so that you can use it to get anomaly research to get a hidden digsite locator. After finding any digsite, then proceed to dig it so that you get a small, if you don't know how, read this part of the xenoarch guide: https://ss13.moe/wiki/index.php/Guide_To_Xenoarchaeology#Actually_Digging (The basics are that, Anomaly depth is how much you need to dig, and clearance is how much you can dig without breaking the artifact. For example, A digsite that has 13 cm anomaly depth, and 3 cm clearance, will require you to first dig to 10 cm, since that's anomaly depth minus clearance (you can do this sequencially, for example, you can do 5 + 5 to get 10 for clearance, but you can't go sequencially after passing the clearance, so if you do 2 + 1 to get to the anomaly depth, the artifact will break), and then dig 3 cm, as that will net 13, which is the anomaly depth. If you do that correctly, you will get the artifact, hooray!)
After digging the digsite and getting whichever thing it dropped, grab it and put it in your backpack, then go back to research. Deconstruct the small artifact in the deconstructive analyzer, and produce a digsite locator in the anomaly section of the protolathe. You may want to put it in your pocket along with the depth analyzer for easy access. Head back to the asteroid, and now the real fun begins.

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*2. Actually Being a Xenoarchaeologist*
Now that you are on the asteroid, what you want to do is use the digsite locator CONSTANTLY. Try to get into parts where you see the most digsite tiles so there's a bigger chance of it detecting anything. However, ALWAYS ignore carbon digsites, given that those are pretty much guaranteed to NOT have large artifacts, so they are worthless for that. Once you find a digsite that's not carbon (by using the depth analyzer), do this: First, set the excavation drill to 15cm, then use it to dig all digsite tiles, then, once the excavation drill digs the tiles, use your mining drill on the digged digsite tiles. If the digsite drops debris, use your depth analyzer scanner, if it pings crazily/madly/etc, then use the 1cm brush on it constantly (but be careful, don't use it too much or you may madden a robot duck if that's the large the debris has), Congrats! you now have a large artifact, if you did everything correctly. However, this method is very luck reliant, and sometimes, you may have no luck at all, so remember to keep in mind that you will eventually get a large, even if it takes some time. Bring the large artifact to the xenoarch wing so you may analyze it 3 times, then deconstruct those papers in the deconstructive analyzer for 6 anomaly (basically the hardcap), you may want to analyze the large one more time to actually know what it does, if it's a generic one (the ones that have different effects/triggers/effect ranges).

Now, this process can be made MUCH more easier and effective by having advanced tools (being, diamond excavation drill, diamond drill, and advanced digsite locator) The diamond excavation drills changes the process completely, now being setting the diamond excavation drill to 50cm, then digging up digsite tiles twice. This completely digs the digsite in a fast and effective way. The diamond drill is used for moving between digsites in a timely manner, given that it has no delay at all. The advanced digsite locator tells you which digsite type it is (carbon, iron, mercury, etc) leaving no need to use the depth analyzer on digsites to know if they're carbon, given that the locator does it for you. However, you need anomaly 3 for it, so that means you need to either deconstruct large artifact analysis papers or deconstruct a small that has deconstruct value of 2, you can see them in this wiki page: https://ss13.moe/wiki/index.php/Guide_to_Research_and_Development#Anomaly_Research (Generally, anomaly research is useful for cyborg upradges and getting the advanced digsite locator, and any rare small artifacts will generally give you more research when deconstructed than normal small artifacts) and it is worth getting the research. A bag of holding may be useful too, since it gives you unlimited space to put your artifact goodies in. However, the process is mostly the same as in the non-upradged tools one, it is just way more effective and enjoyable, really.
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*3. Understanding Larges*
Now, once that you have found your large artifact, if it's an static large artifact (one that has always does the same thing, for example, the supermatter crystal, the construct shell, the giga drill, etc) Then you can simply analyze it three times for anomaly 6 and then use it for whatever thing you want, or you can sell it for money. Be creative! If it is however, a generic artifact, (one that has random effects, triggers and effect ranges) then what you want to do, is put the generic artifact in one of those small rooms that have large analyzers (mostly since those rooms are small and means the xenoarch wing doesn't get completely destroyed if it has a destructive/dangerous effect) And you want to analyze it four times, if anomaly research is not done, if it is, only analyze it often so you can look at what it does. (use those three papers for research, one so you can know what it does, and keep it for posterity) . Once you have analyzed it and have the analysis paper, refer to this wiki page for what the things that the paper say means: http://ss13.moe/wiki/index.php/Xenoarchaeology_Spoilers#Large_Artifact_Cheat_Sheet -- You can simply read this page to know what it does by using process of elimination regarding what the paper says, but some small tips, and a simple explanation:
- Basically, every artifact has at least one effect and one trigger. Those are closely related, as the primary effect and trigger (and only effect and trigger if the artifact does not have secondary effects), will activate respectively. For example, if you have an artifact whose effect is emitting oxygen, and the trigger is touching it, it will emit oxygen when you touch it. Things get complicated with the introduction of secondary effects and triggers, which I explain further in the guide. Now what does the things that the paper says when you analyze the large artifact mean, do you ask? Well, basically, the paper will tell you from a wide range of effect types, effect ranges and activation triggers, and those effect types are basically just a range of effects, for example, if the paper tells you the artifact has electromagnetic energy, what it is trying to say to you is that it will either drain or charge cells, emit darkness, EMP, emit projectiles or will damage/repair borgs. What you gotta do, is experiment and try to figure out which one of those effects the artifact has. With triggers it's basically the same, for example, if the artifact tells you it's activated by prolonged energetic interaction with artifact surface, it is either activated by moving it fast or by putting it over a wire with power. Effect types do not really fit into that, since you will know which effect type the effect has easily after you read the paper, and it's always one of three, for example, if the artifact heals people and that effect is emitting in a periodic burst, that means that it will pulse its effect sporadically. Anyways, examining each effect type, effect, trigger type, trigger and effect range is completely out of the scope of this guide, so simply read the page that I linked above and experiment to see which effect or trigger it is.
- Large artifacts have an approximately 25% chance to have a secondary effect and trigger, which are the same as primary effect and triggers except they don't always activate even when their trigger is done (for example, even if I touch a large artifact that has a secondary effect which is activated by touch, it will not always activate).
- FIRST OF ALL, it may be wise to activate artifacts on the exotic particles pad with the suppressing field on (which makes artifact effects do nothing while it is active), in order to avoid Bad Things.
- You can activate the coin artifacts with a choco-coin, which is the easiest way.
- The chip artifacts are easily activated by just printing even 1 chip of money from your PDA.
- For artifacts activated by high pressure/heat, I recommend to use welder fuel and lighters/welding tools (I recommend to do it in a small room, like the one where you analyzed the large)
- For artifacts activated by low pressure/cold, use your RCD and deconstruct the floor if you want to get exotic particles, if not, then simply go to space.
- For gas activated artifacts, the best way is simply to get one canister with that gas from toxins and opening it for some time in the small room where you analyzed the large, and eventually it will get activated by one gas (if it didn't get activated by simply being in the xenoarch wing with normal gas conditions, then exclude oxygen and nitrogen)

Now, onto exotic particles, if the artifact has an effect that you really find interesting and want to use without much hassle (consider it for some time, you can only have 2 handheld artifacts at the same time) then you may want to use the exotic particles harvester. You use it by putting an artifact on the exotic particles pad, then activating the suppressing field (but the effect you want to harvest HAS to be activated in order to harvest it (you can, however, activate the effect while it is on the pad with the suppressing field active), then putting a exotic battery on the exotic particles harvester (you can put a battery even if there is no artifact in the pad, but it will do nothing), then, you select which effect to harvest (the primary effect will be called the artifact's name with an -a suffix, and the secondary effect will be called the artifact's name with an -b suffix, although this does bug out sometimes and the primary and secondary effect names are switched, for no reason at all), after that, the exotic battery will begin getting the exotic particles, and it will be done at 100%, but some effects take shorter or longer than others. Once the exotic battery reaches 100%, you can eject it, and insert it into an anomaly battery utilizer, and it is done. Now, you are able to interact with the handheld artifact by clicking on it (or pressing Z), and you can either eject the battery, activate it instantly, or activated it with a timer, which will cause it to activate the effect that you chose when harvesting. This can be really useful, as it allows you to have handheld artifacts that heal, stop time, or stun people. Those handheld artifacts have 200 charge, and it does take quite a while for them to empty, so you don't have to worry much about that.
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*CONCLUSION*
As you can see, xenoarch is arguably the most RNG dependant job on the station, but it doesn't mean it isn't fun! Being so RNG dependant is precisely what makes xenoarch so fun, as you'll rarely get the exact same large artifact (unless it is an static one, of course), and you can have a lot of fun with it if you're creative, as always, experiment, and tell JevilUndertale#9645 if you want him to add anything else to this guide. Have a good day, and hope you have fun with xenoarch! also this page is cool https://bwo.ink Broly Culo will remain supreme.