ikexplosion Posted February 18 Report Posted February 18 This is a small theory, but it started because it bothered me that the meteoric iron looks so different compared to the regular iron and steel. The meteor iron is white with flecks of gold, and it made me wonder: Are these meteors from the Rust World? It's mentioned in lore that the Rust World once shone with clean metal and gem stones, so maybe due to the current temporal instability of both the Rust World and ours, meteors from the Rust World are crashing onto our world, and those meteors aren't rusted because they never had contact with the Rust World's rot event. Idk, just a thought I'm wondering if anyone else had.
LadyWYT Posted February 18 Report Posted February 18 2 hours ago, ikexplosion said: This is a small theory, but it started because it bothered me that the meteoric iron looks so different compared to the regular iron and steel. The meteor iron is white with flecks of gold, and it made me wonder: Are these meteors from the Rust World? I really doubt it, especially since when you see both dimensions try to merge, the Rust stuff always springs up from below the ground. Likewise, the monsters get worse the deeper underground the player ventures. The more likely reason that meteoric iron looks the way it does, is so that it looks different than both iron and steel. Iron is a darker grey than steel in order for the two to be easily told apart at a glance; making meteoric iron yet another shade of grey would just muddy the waters, so to speak. If you look up examples of meteoric iron, there are some types that do have golden flecks, or that have been polished to be extra shiny. I daresay the in-game appearance is a mix of the prettiest examples to help it stand out. 4
EnbyKaiju Posted February 19 Report Posted February 19 Meteoric Iron being a very bright colour doesn't make a ton of sense, but I agree with Lady WYT that it makes it stand out. It contrasts well against the other materials, and against the very dark & corrupt colour palette of the rust/rot elements of the game. Personally I love it because it's a perfect contrast to Black Bronze, which holds that slightly purple black tone. So one thing I love to do in long games is have a set of black bronze plate on display next to a set of meteoric iron plate. The black/purple vs white/gold is just stunning. The game designers have done a damn good job when it comes to contrasts, even if they take the extreme examples found in the real world to make that happen.
Teh Pizza Lady Posted March 3 Report Posted March 3 On 2/18/2026 at 7:37 AM, ikexplosion said: This is a small theory, but it started because it bothered me that the meteoric iron looks so different compared to the regular iron and steel. The meteor iron is white with flecks of gold, and it made me wonder: Are these meteors from the Rust World? On 2/19/2026 at 5:04 PM, EnbyKaiju said: Meteoric Iron being a very bright colour doesn't make a ton of sense On 2/18/2026 at 9:46 AM, LadyWYT said: The more likely reason that meteoric iron looks the way it does, is so that it looks different than both iron and steel. Meteoric iron is actually an iron-nickel alloy that ranges in composition from 5% - 65% nickel by mass. This property makes it corrosion-resistant and also allows it to polish quite nicely from normal use/wear. Meteoric iron is actually where the inspiration for stainless steel originated. You only need to add chromium to meteoric iron and you will have stainless steel. That is why the metal in-game looks bright and shiny compared to iron and steel which will begin to oxidize and lose their shine as they cool. 1
EnbyKaiju Posted March 3 Report Posted March 3 38 minutes ago, Teh Pizza Lady said: Meteoric iron is actually an iron-nickel alloy that ranges in composition from 5% - 65% nickel by mass. This property makes it corrosion-resistant and also allows it to polish quite nicely from normal use/wear. Meteoric iron is actually where the inspiration for stainless steel originated. You only need to add chromium to meteoric iron and you will have stainless steel. That is why the metal in-game looks bright and shiny compared to iron and steel which will begin to oxidize and lose their shine as they cool. This makes sense to me, think I was just looking at a bunch of historic examples previously and wasn't taking the material composition into account. A mostly-nickel material would definitely make it shinier in comparison. Though it does make we wish we had more uses for nickel in VS overall as it's currently pretty lacking. I'd even settle for nickle-alloy plating for lanterns in the late game.
Teh Pizza Lady Posted March 3 Report Posted March 3 (edited) 18 hours ago, EnbyKaiju said: This makes sense to me, think I was just looking at a bunch of historic examples previously and wasn't taking the material composition into account. A mostly-nickel material would definitely make it shinier in comparison. Though it does make we wish we had more uses for nickel in VS overall as it's currently pretty lacking. I'd even settle for nickle-alloy plating for lanterns in the late game. I might try my hand at making a few mods that do this, mostly for my own gameplay. Adding chromite to meteoric iron in a proto-blast furnace might even simulate a type of stainless steel, but from what I can tell it requires a massive amount of fuel to do it right... I suppose that's a potential use for the coking oven aside from making cupronickel since that's all it *is* good for now. But, a shiny stainless steel reflector in a lantern might be a huge boon over the ones we have now. Edited March 3 by Teh Pizza Lady 1
EnbyKaiju Posted March 3 Report Posted March 3 Just now, Teh Pizza Lady said: I suppose that's a potential use for the coking oven aside from making cupronickel since that's all it *is* good for now. Yeah, I hope they give us some good uses for the coking oven sometime soon because it's a relatively large resource outlay for something that only does one thing (and not very well). Needing to use it to make higher-tier metal alloys makes a lot of sense and is probably what's intended.
LadyWYT Posted March 3 Report Posted March 3 1 hour ago, Teh Pizza Lady said: I suppose that's a potential use for the coking oven aside from making cupronickel since that's all it *is* good for now. 1 hour ago, EnbyKaiju said: Needing to use it to make higher-tier metal alloys makes a lot of sense and is probably what's intended. In fairness though, given how reliant Jonas tech seems to be on cupronickel--if we had a lot more Jonas tech options then the coke oven would probably be seeing a lot more use. 1
Teh Pizza Lady Posted March 4 Report Posted March 4 18 hours ago, LadyWYT said: In fairness though, given how reliant Jonas tech seems to be on cupronickel--if we had a lot more Jonas tech options then the coke oven would probably be seeing a lot more use. I'm really hoping that later updates to the story allows us to peruse Jonas's library or something and find blueprints for the mechanisms so that we can effectively craft them.
LadyWYT Posted March 4 Report Posted March 4 15 minutes ago, Teh Pizza Lady said: I'm really hoping that later updates to the story allows us to peruse Jonas's library or something and find blueprints for the mechanisms so that we can effectively craft them. If not buy them from Jonas himself.
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