Doloc Town Environmental Modifier and Terraforming
Core Extractor, secret-cave wiring, and the stages that open wetlands and Old City.
The Environmental Modifier — the legendary terraforming machine in a secret cave — is the mid-game wall that looks like a bug. It is not. You need story flags, a sprint jetpack, placeable small batteries, and a wiring sequence that does not match the archive 1:1. This page is the dedicated repair guide. For quest order around it, use the spoiler-aware Walkthrough. Doloc Town remains single-player through the August 5, 2026 1.0 launch.
Patch 1.00.04 raised Environmental Modifier point gains, so full restoration is easier than in 1.00.03. You still need the cave wiring sequence; the grind after power-on is shorter. Confirm later sell prices on doloctowndb.wiki if you farm restoration crops for gold.
If you are broke while this quest is open, earn gold first on the Money page. The machine will wait. The 5,000 G port bill after dredging will not.
How the quest actually starts
Finish Night Assembly: attend the treaty port between 18:00 and 22:00, then break the River Valley rockfall with a copper pickaxe (Merlin: about 1,500 G, five copper ingots, three old pickaxes). Deliver the tattered layout blueprint to Mayor Claud, then show it to Mira at the Doloc Valley outpost.
Investigate the Core Extractor in the mining area on the left side of the valley. You need a jetpack with sprint / air dash. Rubber for that dash is a research-and-craft beat, not a shop impulse buy. Enemies here hit harder than Outskirts blobs — bring food from Cooking and a drone loadout from Drone Combat.
Finding the secret cave
The terraforming apparatus sits in a secret cave tied to the farm / town side toward Ridge Valley: from the farm go down, left, and up. Players describe a former landslide with a small pond and trampoline in front. Story progress clears the entrance; if the hole is still rock, you are early. Enter, inspect the machine, and report to Alchemy at the botanical lab.
Ask Mody about power repair. The encyclopedia Archives → terraforming circuit guide is the hint sheet. Community reports are consistent: the in-cave terminals do not copy the archive pictures exactly. There is a twist. The two batteries are the placeable base batteries, not mystery quest items with a different name.
Materials and wiring
Craft two small batteries and five wires. A common battery recipe is two copper ingots, five rubber, one charger — confirm in your workbench; Crafting and Materials list the current 1.0 inputs.
Archive-style pairing players use as a starting map (expect the cave to remap colors):
- Left battery blue → right battery red
- Left battery red → machine green
- Right battery blue → damaged yellow
- Machine black → white
- Join the two opposite wires at the bottom of the machine
- Power the panel
Wrong picks fail the minigame but return materials. Do not vendor your last copper because a wire looked “used up.” Achievement Eden’s Tech tracks this arc.
Steam threads still catch people here in 1.0. If nothing matches, re-read Mody’s archive, confirm you placed small batteries (not large house batteries), and try the “twist” instead of forcing the screenshot from a guide that used an older build.
After power: dredging and stages
River dredging starts when the machine lives. Insert the core sample (Alchemy also grants Eden Fruit around this beat — a permanent stat item; store it, do not cook it by accident). Terraforming Phase I is a start button, not an instant climate fix.
Later stages eat more than one sample type. Community and JP quest lists split energy tracks:
- Plant energy — seed research / crop database with Alchemy and Sakko
- Animal energy — fish and livestock records (this is the slow one; see Fishing and Ranching)
- Machine energy — monster catalog from combat
- Environment energy — outdoor resource collection across Regions
Side traders feed terraforming parts: Kenenimuu shrine relics (resonance device), Shylock’s haggle for the Biomass Directory (advanced gene-pool traits), Chip’s leftover access card (geological scanner), Paiea’s water-purification core. Those are parallel, not skippable if you want the late modifier ranks before Old City.
Wetland restoration (Axolotus / lotus prototype, four pipe kits from Industry assembly tech) and Old City power districts are downstream. Pipe kits typically want a metal frame, iron ingot, and plastics — craft extras; four repair sites are not sequential but one sits behind a strong enemy.
Known pain points after 1.0
Patch 1.00.03 fixed looping Old City quest animations and some achievement flags. A Guardian battle soft-lock after a loss is still a listed known issue — save before the fight. Idle agricultural drones are unrelated but will steal days you meant to spend on samples.
When a number on this page disagrees with an in-game tooltip, trust the client. When you need item IDs and sell values for the batteries and wires, cross-check doloctowndb.wiki from the community database hub.
Related pages
- Walkthrough — full act order
- Secrets — unmarked rooms and the plant-analysis disk
- Tech tree — assembly and jetpack gates
- NPCs — Mira, Mody, Alchemy, Paiea
- Version 1.0 — story finale context
The wasteland does not heal because you watered tomatoes. It heals because you wired the cave correctly and then kept cataloging the world.
Frequently Asked Questions
Quick answers to the most common questions.
Where is the Environmental Modifier?
In a secret cave toward Ridge Valley from the farm (down, left, up), often behind a former landslide with a pond and trampoline. Story progress opens the entrance.
What materials repair the power system?
Two placeable small batteries and five wires. Batteries are the base craftable units, not unique named quest batteries.
Why doesn’t the archive match the cave?
Mody’s archive is a hint with a twist. Follow the color logic, then adjust to the terminals you actually see. Failed attempts refund materials.
Do I need a sprint jetpack for the Core Extractor?
Yes. The extractor is in the left-side mining area of Doloc Valley and expects air dash / sprint jetpack mobility.
What comes after the machine turns on?
Insert the core sample, start Phase I forming, then wetland pipes and later Old City stages. See the Walkthrough for spoiler order.
Is this required for 1.0’s ending?
Yes. Old City Ruins and the story finale sit behind terraforming progress, not behind a skip button.