Blueprint

Close-up of a blueprint

Engineers often ask how they can make backups of their designs, how they can make a library of their favourite ships, how they can share grids with other players, or how they can "copy and paste" ships in Survival Mode. The answer is, use blueprints (F10 key)!

A blueprint stores all blocks and their names and positions, their colour and skins, their control panel configuration and PB scripts, the toolbar actions and groups, DLC blocks and modded blocks. You can create blueprints in Survival and in Creative worlds.

Blueprints are the best way to design ships in one world and recreate them in another: When Creative-style Copy and Paste is not enabled in the World Settings, Blueprint projections are a "legal" in-game way to allow players to transfer grids between worlds of any type (with some limitations).

How to download shared blueprints

Other players have created and shared great things! Subscribe to blueprints to make them available in your game.

1. First you must subscribe to some blueprints:
   • Log on to Steam, go to the workshop, select type:blueprints, and subscribe to blueprints there. (Unfortunately the search is a mess).
     https://steamcommunity.com/workshop/browse/?appid=244850
   • Or log on to mod.io and subscribe to blueprints there, respectively
     https://spaceengineers.mod.io/
2. In game, press F10 and open your Blueprints screen.
3. Click the button that looks like a page with five symbols on it. This button filters the list between many options:
   • Show all blueprints
   • Show only saved locally or only in the Cloud
   • Show only subscribed through Steam Workshop or Mod.io
4. Search for the blueprint that you want to use.

Copy it to your clipboard to paste it (in creative mode), or select it inside a projector (in survival mode) and weld it.

Before taking a blueprint

Before blueprinting, prepare the grid:

• Name the grid uniquely. There are no folders and no custom search tags on the Blueprint screen.
• Name functional blocks and block groups uniquely, or replace Groups by Timers.
• Configure the grid's cockpit Tool Bar (if applicable).
• Decide for each functional block whether it needs to be on or off!

Consider in which situation you intend to use this blueprint. Examples:

• Do you intend to creative-paste it in mid-air and therefore the thrusters must be on? Or do you intend to 3D-print it and thrusters must be off because they burn the 3D Printer? If the thrusters are off when you take the blueprint, then the projected grid's thrusters are off. If the thrusters are on when taking the blueprint, the projected thrusters are on.
• Switch off self-projectors. If repair-projectors or Consoles on the ship are on and project a blueprint of the ship that projects a blueprint of the ship that projects a blueprint of the ship, and so on, your game performance is not going to have a good time.
• Same for Batteries on recharge/discharge, or Hydrogen Tanks on stockpile, any functional block, do you need them on or off when the grid appears in game?

Tip: If you want to see the point around which the blueprint rotates before you take a blueprint, open the Info screen, and enable the Show Grid Pivot checkbox.

How to name non-functional blueprints

When blueprinting a non-functional grid --for example, a ready-to-weld wall or floor segment-- that has no cockpit and no terminal access, you cannot open its Info Screen. How do you name such a grid?

1. Temporarily attach a Control Panel.
2. Use that panel to access the grid's Terminal, open to the Info Screen, and name the grid.
3. Remove the Control Panel. (!)
4. Take the blueprint.

How to create a blueprint

To create a blueprint, target the grid and press (CTRL-B key).

If the grid has subgrids on rotors/pistons/hinges (this is called a multigrid), the blueprint also contains all subgrid parts.

• To blueprint only the one targeted (sub)grid, press (CTRL-SHIFT-B key) instead, e.g. when blueprinting a small-grid ship docked to a Connector of a large-grid station. Separate subgrid blueprints are needed when using projectors for multigrids in Survival Mode.

• To blueprint all connected grids including magnetically locked grids, use (CTRL+ALT+B key) instead. This can be desired if you want to copy and paste a whole station or mothership including docked ships in Creative Mode.

Why do you care about this distinction? You can copy and paste whole multigrids in Creative Mode. But you cannot project multigrids in Survival mode: Only one (sub)grid can be projected at a time. For details and mod workarounds, see Projector.

The Blueprints Screen

How to share blueprints

You have the option to upload blueprints to the Steam Workshop or mod.io. Sharing blueprints this way does not only mean that other players can download them, but you yourself will be able to recover them if you should ever lose your local copies.

Do not copy another author’s work without permission, on Steam or mod.io, or anywhere else.

• Steam: Press F10, select a blueprint and press the Publish button.
• Mod.io: Upload to https://spaceengineers.mod.io/add

If the mod.io integration does not work, check in the Game Options whether you have agreed to the service‘s consent.

Note: Grids (and their blueprints) can contain DLC blocks and modded blocks. Whether you can successfully share a blueprint depends strongly on whether the recipient has the DLC and/or mod installed. List "Required DLC" for the selected blueprint; on the recipient's Blueprints screen, the DLCs appear as symbols. Either hover the mouse over the symbol to read the tooltip, or check the symbols on the DLC and Achievement Icons page. If the recipient projects or pastes a shared blueprint with unowned blocks, these blocks will be missing. Depending on what it is, they may be able to identify the missing blocks and replace them with non-DLC equivalents. If the missing DLC block was structural though, the pasted blueprint will break in two.

How to send blueprints to players

Have a recommendation but you can't copy and paste the Steam link in game? You can send a published Workshop blueprint quickly to another player from inside the game:

1. Press (F10 key).
2. Select the Steam Workshop blueprint from the list.
3. Select the recipient's name from the Send To menu.

The recommended blueprint will appear in the Steam Workshop category on the F10 Blueprint screen of the recipient, where they can choose to subscribe to it.

(Open question: Does the recipient have to be on the Friends list? Online on the same server?)

How to view and spawn blueprints

After making a blueprint, press F10 to open the Blueprint screen to view (and spawn in) your blueprinted grids. This works both in survival mode and creative mode, but there are important differences.

• In creative games with copy&paste enabled, you can copy blueprints directly from the blueprint screen and paste them into the world without any costs. Pasting includes connected grids and subgrids.
• In survival games, you must build a Projector to make the blueprint visible in the world, and then you must spend components and time to weld it up. Projectors however do not support projecting connected grids or subgrids -- read about details on the respective pages.
• Admins with creative tools enabled can also allow themselves to copy and paste blueprints into a survival world.

If the blueprint contains DLC blocks or modded blocks that the player does not have access to, then they cannot paste/project the blueprint fully. If another player builds the DLC blocks for them, and transfers ownership of the grid to them, they can use it normally.

Required mods must always be installed to be able to paste/project blueprints that use them.

Tip: In Creative Mode (or in Survival Mode with Creative Tools enabled), you can use (CTRL+SHIFT+C key) to copy (or (CTRL+SHIFT+X key) to cut) only the targeted subgrid. Use this to paste missing subgrids onto their grids using (CTRL+V key). After pasting, check the ownership and make sure it's not owned by "nobody".

Make backups of blueprints

On Windows PCs, blueprints are saved locally in your "%appdata%/SpaceEngineers/Blueprints" folder by default. Tip: If you cannot see this folder in Windows Explorer, search online for advice "How to show hidden files and folders in Windows <your version>".

This is where the game stores your blueprint files, so don't forget to make backups of "%appdata%/SpaceEngineers" when you move to a new PC!

Rename blueprints

If you forgot to name something, it will have a default name like "large grid 123" or "small grid 321". Similarly, if a blueprint with the same name already exists, a number is added to the name automatically. If you want to clean up duplicates and remove the automatic numbering or rename it with proper versioning, press (F10 key), find the grid in the Blueprint list, and click Rename.

Replace blueprints

Pressing (CTRL-B key) and creating new blueprints of the same grid repeatedly gets messy and fills up the local blueprints screen with annoying numbered copies that you will need to delete manually.

To replace a blueprint with a new version in Creative Mode:

1. Copy the grid by pressing (CTRL-C key) to place the new version in your clipboard.
2. Press (F10 key) to open the Blueprint screen.
3. Select the older version from the list
4. Click the Replace button.

It will ask you whether you are sure that you want to replace the blueprint with the copy in the clipboard.

Troubleshooting

Steam Workshop troubleshooting

The Steam Cloud often interfers with saving Blueprints, most players switch it off.

1. Open the Options > Game screen and disable "Steam Cloud".
2. Make backups of "%appdata%/SpaceEngineers/Blueprints/" because without the Steam Cloud, blueprints are saved locally.
3. Enable the Steam Cloud feature only if you have more than one PC and want to transfer Saved Games from one PC to the other.

There is also a common UX issue that publishing blueprints on the Steam Workshop fails simply because it failed to upload the thumbnail screenshot, but the error message does not offer a solution. Try the following workaround:

1. Open the hidden folder "%appdata%/SpaceEngineers/Blueprints/" and find the folder containing your blueprint.
2. Open the file named either thumb.png or thumb.jpg in MS Paint (or any other graphic editor of your liking) and simply resize it smaller.
3. Resave the file and overwrite the old file so that it is less than 1 MB in size.
4. Then try publishing again.

Console troubleshooting

PlayStation Console Storage and Cloud Storage has a save data limit of 1.08Gb. To reduce the size of your saves, disable the backup function by setting the backup value to zero in the Advanced World Settings. Then upload your saves and blueprints to mod.io!