Sandustry Tools and Weapons

Buildings process pixels. Tools and weapons let you stand in the pit and change the physics by hand. Sandustry’s research tree splits them across Tools 1–4 and Guns 1–2. This page is a how-to for each item in the live Early Access build — what it does, what it does not do, and when it is worth the gold. For a ranked buy order see Tools and Weapons Priority. For the full unlock list see Research Tree.

Tools 1 — Flamethrower

Official description: melt ice and burn stuff. In the factory that means three jobs:

• Burn Slag → Burnt Slag for the Kinetic Slag Press.
• Melt Ice so wetting pools and tunnels flow again.
• Boil Water → Steam that rises and returns as rain, which is how you move water before Pipes.

Firn (solid snow) must be dug out before it will burn. Pointing the flamethrower at a packed firn wall does nothing useful. Snow that is already loose burns into Water (Snow, Firn, and Frostbed). The tool deals flame damage and is upgradeable. It is the first tool most players should buy after Logistics — slag piles are income, not scenery (Slag Processing).

Lava embers also ignite Moss and Flowers. Keep the flamethrower out of the greenhouse unless you are doing a controlled harvest (Flowers and Planters).

Tools 2 — Vacuum

Official line: a vacuum that moves sand effectively. It sucks and it blows, depending on how you face the pile. Use it to:

• Pull Wet Sand out of a residue pit before it contaminates the press.
• Relocate Sand, Slag, or Amethelis overflow without rebuilding a belt.
• Clean a Collector that filled with the wrong pixel.

The Vacuum does not replace conveyors. If you vacuum the same haul every minute, you needed Logistics, not a bigger hose. It is not listed as upgradeable on the official tool page. Buy it when retrofit speed is the bottleneck, not when you still lack a shaker.

Tools 3 — Cryoblaster

Official jobs: create snow, freeze water, and solidify lava. That makes it the opposite of the flamethrower and the key to renewable water:

• Cryoblaster (or digging Frostbed) produces Snow.
• Burn that snow for Water.
• Snow plus water becomes Ice; snow plus lava becomes Scoria and the snow vanishes.
• Cryoblaster on lava is how you start the Scoria → Cinder → remelt relocation chain (Lava, Scoria, and Cinder).

It does not deal combat damage and is not upgradeable. Elevate it when a lava trench escapes or when your lake is dry and Frostbed is closer than a new biome. Do not cryo your wetting pool “to store water” unless you enjoy mining ice out of the launcher well.

Tools 4 — Grappling Hook

Unlocks movement. The Early Access movement rewrite already makes you faster and lets you traverse pixels automatically; the hook is for shafts, artifact rooms, and getting back to a surface factory after a long S descend (Movement and Hover, Dig Deeper). Buy it when returning from depth costs more time than the gold node. Pair with Lights 1 — a hook into an unlit lava cave is how runs end.

Guns 1 — Gun

Unlocks the Gun (damage type shown as a combat icon in the research tab). Factory use is mostly Shatterstone and ruin rooms. Early Access footage shows dead-end walls that the scanner labels Shatterstone: the shovel will not break them, the gun will. Guns are B-tier for a surface refinery and A-tier the moment an artifact door sits behind stone you cannot dig (Artifacts and Puzzles). Some streams also use a flare shot to light a hole before Lights research — treat flares as a visibility trick, not a mining tool.

Guns 2 — Rocket Launcher

Unlocks the Rocket Launcher. It is a mining and puzzle tool as much as a weapon. Official and patch notes that still matter:

• Napalm upgrade can heat water into Steam the same way the flamethrower does.
• Demo Hotfix 8 nerfed the launcher against RedSand — do not plan a redsand quarry around rocket spam.
• It is a fast way to open volume; it is a bad way to precision-cut a shaker deck.

If you came from the demo’s “rocket water” culture, Early Access expects steam rain and snow burn instead. Rockets still delete terrain. They are not a water tap.

Fluxite upgrades that feel like tools

These are not research nodes, but they change how tools feel:

• Material scanner — read combinations without a wiki tab.
• Expanded grabber capacity — fewer vacuum trips.
• Hover — fly and phase through buildings (community vote in Demo Hotfix 7, carried into EA movement).
• Dig speed — shovel and gun work faster.

Spend order: Fluxite Upgrades. Open the panel with U. Hold F to pick an already-placed building instead of scrolling the hotbar.

What not to confuse with tools

Digger and Hauler Drones are Drones 1 buildings, not handheld tools (Drones). Lights are a research branch, not a gun. Demolisher, Marquee, and Pipe Remover are edit utilities (Collectors and Lights). If a YouTube video mentions a “mining laser,” confirm it against the live research tab — this wiki only documents tools that appear in official research text or widely reproduced EA footage.

A practical unlock path

1. Flamethrower as soon as slag or ice blocks income.
2. Vacuum when cleanup steals the session.
3. Gun when Shatterstone or a ruin gates you.
4. Grappling Hook when depth is the commute.
5. Cryoblaster when you need snow-water or lava control.
6. Rocket Launcher when you are opening biomes, not nursing the starter lake.

That path matches Early Game Tips and leaves gold for Starter Factory machines. Tools complement shakers; they do not wet sand.