After leveling up high enough in Once Human, you’ll run into the issue that every player in the mid to late game phases struggle with, and that is the fact that you’ll need acid for almost everything. In this guide, we will be showing you a few ways on how to get as much acid as fast as possible, though your mileage may vary depending on a lot of factors!
Best Acid Farming Methods
There are different ways to get acid, whether actively or passively, and some of which may not be so obvious to you. We’ll start with the most well-known method and work our way to the more obscure or complicated methods below:
Method #1. Killing Deviants
The most obvious way to farm a lot of acid is by simply running through towns and killing deviants. Most of them drop acid in increments of five each, and this is also a nice way to passively get some EXP if you aren’t already capped out.
Any zone with a lot of deviants in it will be great for this, regardless of the zone’s level. Blackfell Fallen Zone is a decent option since it’s close to a hub area, allowing you to quickly access any teleportation tower to travel elsewhere when you’re done.
Increasing Yield From Deviants
If you’re going this route and you have a lot of ciphers to spare, consider unlocking the Dishes III memetic under the “Logistics” tree. This will unlock various food recipes, including the Preserved Deviated Chops.
This recipe will require 3 deer meat, 1 peppercorn, and 2 salt. It will give you a +50% acid drop bonus from deviants for 30 minutes upon eating it.
Combined with Stardust Tea, you can increase this acid drop boost or lengthen the buff’s duration depending on what deviated herb you use to make the beverage. This will require significantly more time to setup, however, as deviated herbs are not easy to come by, even with your own farm.
Method #2. Buying From Other Players
This one is a little rough depending on what server and world you are on, but basically, some players are willing to sell acid for either energy links or in exchange for other resources. It’s up to you to decide whether their prices are worth it, so you’ll just have to check vending machines or world chat.
In the world map, you can toggle whether to view vending machines set up by other players. This will show you a very vague preview of what they are selling, but to check whether they have acid, you’ll have to go there and see for yourself.
You can try to hop worlds at a teleportation tower to search for these, but I would highly recommend simply asking potential sellers in world chat first so that you don’t have to go through the painstaking process of switching aimlessly. They’ll typically tell you which world to go.
Some players might set up vending machines on the back of their pickup trucks and leave it in high traffic locations. This is not a common practice in my server, and in many others, so check the world map to be sure.
Method #3. Refining Your Own Acid
Finally, making your own acid is also an option, and there are a few ways to go around doing this. Be warned, though, this process is complicated, extremely slow, and consumes a ton of power.
I’m going to cut the whole process into several steps so you (hopefully) don’t get lost, as I sure as hell did when I made my first “passive” acid farm. Honestly, this whole thing is poorly explained in the game.
Step #1. Find a Polluted Zone
First, you will want to find a polluted zone that you can place your base on. In order to know if a place is polluted, simply look at the cradle on your back and check whether there is a number on it indicating the level of pollution around you.
There are a few other ways to tell whether a place is polluted aside from this, including the beeping noise that acts as a sort of alternative Geiger counter sound. Your sanity will also go down up to a certain amount depending on your resistance level.
Once you find such an area, try to move your territory there. Ideally, you want to have sections of the base free from pollution so you can recover sanity after messing around with your acid farm.
If you want an example, check the map image below. My base is located right beside the Blackfell Oil Fields, and it’s essentially attached to the point of interest.
This place will let you pump polluted water and crude oil at the same time. This might be occupied in your server, though, as it is a somewhat popular spot.
Step #2. Set Up Water Pumps
Next, you will want to set up water pumps at the polluted spots. This part is important, as placing it on a tile that isn’t considered to be polluted will result in the wrong yields.
NOTE: Water pumps have to be placed on the soil, though with a bit of janky rotating and the use of small foundations, you can somewhat fit several of them in a way that keeps them “indoors”, as seen in the image below.
When placing a water pump, you will also want to increase its height to a seemingly ridiculous degree. This is because gravity will play a part in the next step. This is something you have to keep in mind for regular water farms as well, so there’s a bonus tip if you didn’t already know.
Step #3. Set Up the Correct Purifier
Next, you will have to unlock the Reverse Osmosis Purifiers memetic under the “Logistics” tree. This is because the polluted water that your pumps will be producing have to be placed in an osmosis water purifier. The compact version of the purifier will not work.
Make sure that your purifier is at a lower elevation than the water pumps. Once that has been set up, stay in build mode and connect pipes from each pump to the purifier. If everything is in order, polluted water should automatically be funneled into the purifier over time.
Basically, every five minutes, each pump will send around four bottles of polluted water to the purifier. For every two bottles, a single bottle of impure acid will be produced. This is where the next step comes in.
Step #4. “Brewing” Up the Acid
Finally, you will also need to unlock the Brewing Barrels memetic under the same tech tree. Aside from alcoholic drinks and cheese, you can also use this to refine impure acid.
Using the same logic as earlier, the brewing barrel must be at a lower elevation than the purifier. Luckily, this is already true by default, as it is a very small object in comparison. Connect a pipe between the purifier and brewing barrel.
NOTE: For some reason, there is an issue where impure acid does not automatically go to the brewing barrel. You will have to manually take the impure acid from the purifier and place it in the brewing barrel until this is resolved.
In addition to this, you will also need pure water, which is made by placing dirty water into a water filter or purifier. Depending on where your base is located, you might have to gather dirty water manually (as is the case for me).
By placing both pure water and impure acid into a brewing barrel, you will produce regular acid at a very slow interval. This is a good way of making a lot of acid overnight or while you’re traveling around the map. You can speed this up by making multiple brewing barrels, but be mindful of the 10W power cost of each.
Bonus Method – Specialization Luck
If you are lucky, you might get the option to pick the Art of Stardust Decay memetic specialization. I haven’t personally seen it even after reaching max specs, but it will allow you to craft acid at a furnace at the cost of stardust source.
This may be a decent option if you are willing to spend that specific resource on it, though it is not recommended by a lot of people. A lot of Stardust Source is spent when calibrating equipment, among other more valuable use cases.
And those are all of the methods I can share with you when it comes to farming acid in this game, from easiest to hardest. While you’re here, check out our guide on how to get rich quick in Once Human as well, as it will help you get more energy links to maybe buy acid from other players.
