Pre-alpha codex — written from the build in internal testing. Systems, numbers and features can change before launch. · Join the waitlist
Codex Entry
Glossary
Quick lookup for every term used in the game and this codex.
A — Z
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| 4X | eXplore, eXpand, eXploit, eXterminate — the strategy genre Echoes Beyond belongs to. |
| Black hole system | A rare system where the central body is a black hole instead of a star. Planets, belts and empty orbits behave normally. |
| Charted | A star you have discovered. Granted automatically by any fleet passing nearby or via an Espionage Probe. |
| Claim | Your ownership of a star system. Created when your first colony lands. |
| Colony | A settlement on a planet orbit. Your first colony in a system claims the whole system. |
| Colony cap | Maximum star systems you can hold at once — starts at 25 and grows with Astrophysics research. |
| Drive | Combustion / Impulse / Hyperspace propulsion class. Deeper drive research means faster ships. |
| Exploration haul | A one-time bundle of metal, crystal and aetherium banked when an Explore mission returns from an uncharted star. Astrophysics scales the haul up. |
| Fleet | A group of ships under one order. A fleet is stationed, moving, or recalling. |
| Galactic core | The dense bar + bulge at the centre of the map — the oldest, safest, most crowded space in the galaxy. |
| Galactic disk | The flat plane of stars from the core to the rim, stretching to roughly 70,000 LY. |
| Galactic rim | The frayed outer edge of the disk. Noise-perturbed, with cellular voids and irregular lobes that reach past 70 K LY in some directions. |
| Hyperlane | A travel connection between two stars. Fleets hop along hyperlanes to reach their destination. |
| NPC empire | A computer-controlled civilization holding territory on the map. Their space is visible on the galaxy overlays. |
| Orbit | A position around a system's central body. Every system has exactly 9 orbits, plus exactly 9 sub-orbits distributed across them. |
| Queue | Build and research orders execute one after another, in the order you added them. |
| Specialty | The single-resource focus chosen for a settled orbit (Metal / Crystal / Aetherium / Population). Deepens alongside System Administration. Every specialty is legal on every orbit kind. |
| Spiral arm | One of two bright major arms (or three thinner spur arms) carrying the bulk of stellar density. |
| Station | A settlement on an asteroid belt or empty orbit. Hosts every specialty (including Population on belts as a Belt Habitat). |
| Sub-orbit | A moon or station extension hanging off an orbit. Inherits a share of the parent zone bonus; its own development layer is coming soon. |
| Survey | A Research Ship mission that reveals every orbit in a target system. |
| System | A claimed system with exactly 9 orbits and 9 sub-orbits — the basic unit of empire. Central body is 1-3 stars or, rarely, a black hole. |
| System Administration | The per-system building that unlocks and gates orbit development — deeper administration, deeper specialties. |
| Tech passive | An always-on, empire-wide bonus granted by a research level (e.g. Mining output, Logistics cargo, Hyperspace fuel), stacking on top of per-system zone and specialty bonuses. |
| Zone bonus | Automatic bonus from an orbit's index (inner / mid / outer), active once the orbit is settled. |