Chemistry is a complicated profession and side project to work in Probably Stolen. Your primary task is to take base materials and grind them down into a consumable product, typically Caffeine Pills and Dream Dust. Although you might follow the recipe to the letter, there are a few crucial details that you might not know about, as the instructions don't outline them. You'll learn these details through trial and error, along with experimenting as you start playing the game. In this guide, we're going to give you a thorough breakdown of how chemistry works in Probably Stolen.
How All Chemistry Tools and Machines Work
At the start, it's important to understand the crucial tools you'll be using as a chemist in Probably Stolen. You start each process with a Blender, where you blend the various items you want to break down into a mush. You place your materials, for example, Dream Cap, in the input slot, and then place a water bottle or jug in the container. When you activate the device, it breaks down this material into a substance, and you'll be using this to help create your final product.
The next important tool you'll use is the Heating Plate. This is where you heat the mixture you're working with to help burn the contaminants out of the liquid and transform the extract you were making into a more serviceable product. For example, after blending the Dream Cap with the Blender, it becomes Dream Cap Mush, and you want it to become Dream Cap Extract. We'll explain how you get there more thoroughly below, but the Heating Plate is a crucial component. You want to be careful when using this device, as certain materials can be overheated, potentially damaging them. If the container reaches over 60 degrees Celsius, it destroys the extract.
After the Heating Plate, we have the Evaporator. This is a device that you have to use overnight, and you can expect to get the end result in the morning. Unlike the other tools, the Evaporator does require a battery, and if you don't have a Power Cell to charge it, it won't work, preventing you from getting your final product. The Evaporator is used to remove water and alcohol from a mixture, providing a stronger, more focused end product.
In the morning, after you use an Evaporator, you'll bring your container over to the Chem Finisher and set it to the product you want to make. Continuing with the Dream Cap example, we want to make Dream Dust. We set the Chem Finisher to Dream Dust and confirm. From there, click the 'output' button, and the contents of your container go into your output section, and then you have Dream Dust. You can widely distribute it to customers throughout Probably Stolen, and earn a profit from the original Dream Cap mushrooms you purchased.
Now, the most important tool you'll be using as a Chemist is the Composition Spectrometer, also known as a Chem Scanner. You use this as early as the Blender section, after you've cut up your Dream Cap and have placed it into a container. You'll want to bring the Chem Scanner over the bottle where you cut up your Dream Cap, or whatever product you're making, and then a readout breaks down the entire chemical composition of everything in this bottle. The readout gives you thorough detail on everything, and those details matter immensely throughout the process of creating Dream Dust, or even the simple Caffeine Pills.
You'll use the Chem Scanner in every step of the process. If you're ever planning to dive into Chemistry in Probably Stolen, making sure you have this available is a must-have tool.
Now, once you have all of those tools, it's time to begin making your product. Let's break down the steps you need to follow to create two of the most notable recipes in Probably Stolen: Dream Dust and Caffeine Pills.
How to Make Dream Dust
The process is similar to what's displayed in the Chemistry Manual, but there are some important extra steps you want to follow if you're looking to make a higher purity. We'll start with the basics: place your Dream Cap in the Blender and a water bottle in the container. Use the device, and the Dream Caps will be cut up and thrown into the bottle. This is your Dream Cap Mush, and here is where you want to use your Chem Scanner. Take it to examine the bottle, and you'll see how much Dream Cap Mush you have inside.
The amount of Dream Cap Mush that you have inside the bottle is important. For the next step, you want to take the Alcohol Bottle (it should look like a small vial of purple liquid) and place three to six times as much alcohol as the Dream Cap Mush displayed on the Chem Scanner. For my product, I have 42.90 mL, meaning the smallest amount of Alcohol I want to place into the bottle is 128.7 mL. Anything above that is fine, but I cannot exceed 257.4 mL, as this is six times as much Dream Cap Mush. So, my range is between 128.7 and 257.4 mL. The amount displayed on your Chem Scanner will be different.
Now, to get that amount, you don't want to pour the alcohol from the vial into the water bottle. Instead, use the graduated cylinders or the droppers to get the accurate amounts. Place the alcohol over the graduated cylinder, and it will fit if there's enough alcohol in the vial. For my example, I was able to safely pour alcohol into the 100 mL graduated cylinder, and then place that in the bottle. The result of two 100 mL alcohol pours brought the amount of alcohol to 140 mL inside the bottle, which is the perfect range for what we're doing. All of this is displayed on the Chem Scanner, and you should have this open the entire time to know exactly what you're doing.
With that part finished, there are some additional things you need to clean up before using the Heating Plate. First, there's 3.90 mL of protein in the mixture. That's going to lower the quality of your end result. You can clean that out by placing small amounts of acid into the bottle. You can do this by using the 1 mL dropper on the Bottle of Acidic Solution, and putting that amount into the bottle. You don't want to use too much, as the acid gradually eats up and lowers the protein content. The 1 mL dropper might be slow, but it's worth it to not put in too much acid. Do this until the protein reaches zero. This can take several drops.
Now that you have the protein removed from the contents, it's time to use the Heating Plate. As the Chemistry in-game guide details, you want the contents to be between 40 and 60 degrees Celsius. If you have the Chem Scanner up while you're using the Heating Plate, you can watch as the Dream Cap Mush becomes Dream Cap Extract, which is what you're hunting for to get closer to your end result! Keep it on the Heating Plate until you only have Dream Cap Extract (you can turn off the heating device at any time to prevent it from overheating, and turn it back on to finish it up).
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When you have the Dream Cap Extract, I recommend going through the optional section of pouring your contents into a Water Pitcher and using a Kotten Fabric filter to pour it back into the water bottle. It should remove a good amount of heavy metals and contaminants in the liquid. It likely won't get all of it, based on the quality of the filter, but it does help clean up your product to increase your purity!
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With those steps taken care of, it's time to place your water bottle inside the Evaporator. All you have to do is make sure that the Evaporator has a Power Cell, and then leave it overnight. When you wake up, the contents of the bottle will be lower, but you'll have your nearly finished product.
The last step is to place your bottle container into the Chem Finisher, set it to Dream Dust, and then click output. Continue clicking output until there's nothing left in the bottle, and you'll have all of your products in neat bottles. You can use the Chem Scanner to verify the contents, and you should have a decent starting product. Again, this likely won't be perfect when you're initially starting out, but it's a good introductory point to creating better Dream Dust.
You'll be able to refine and improve this process as you acquire more resources and enhance your tools. This is an important process for the Dream Dust, but you also have Caffeine Pills that follow a similar process that you can sell for smaller profits.
How to Make Caffeine Pills
The process of creating Caffeine Pills is close to the same steps as making Dream Dust. You start by placing the coffee beans into the blender, grinding them up to make Coffee Bean Mush.
With your Chem Scanner, you'll be able to see the breakdown of everything in the water bottle. This time, you have Fat and Oils, rather than Protein. Before you deal with that, place your solvent, the alcohol. You need to follow the same range, so you need to have at least three to six times as much alcohol as you have Coffee Bean Mush. For my bottle, I have 29.12 mL, so I need to be within the range of 87.36 to 174.72 mL of alcohol.
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Like with Dream Mush, before putting it on the Heating Plate, it's time to get rid of the fat and oils. Rather than using the Acidic or Base solutions, you want to use the Lipobond Agent. This removes the fat and oils from liquids, and disappears when you use the Evaporator. Like the Acidic and Base solutions, use an eye dropper to apply the amount to your bottle. If you see Protein in there, use the Acidic bottle to remove it, as if you were making Dream Dust.
After that's finished, take it to the Heating Plate and bring the container up to above 80 degrees Celsius. As the guide advises, coffee is heat resistant, so you don't have to watch the temperature as much.
Once you've used the Heating Pad, filter the contents through your Water Pitcher using the Kotton Frabric, and remove the larger physical deposits, or at least much as you can given the quality of your tools.
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It's time to place the container into your Evaporator, and waiting the full night for it to clear out. In the morning, you should have your nearly complete product.
The last step is to place it into the Chem Finisher, set it to Caffeine Pill, and hit the output button. You want to hit it as many times as you can to get as much as you can from the container, and you can review the product using your Chem Scanner.
These are the two basic building blocks of what you're going to be making in Probably Stolen. There are other recipes for you to learn and create, such as Nightmare Dust, Zyanide Pill, Birth Control Pill, and several others. The Dream Dust and Caffeine Pills are the essential ones that you want to master to learn the basics and use to propel yourself to becoming a better Chemist in Probably Stolen.