The Robot Terminal is a placeable command station crafted at Worktable III, usually as the final Expert Crafter task for Zerine. Place it on your homestead or beside a Moonlit Forest campsite, interact with it, slot in Gathering, Mining, or Logging Robots, and use Assign to give each one a job: Gathering Robots handle homestead crops, flowers, and ranch byproducts; Mining Robots work Moonlit Forest sub-regions; Logging Robots cover the forest. Robots keep working while you are away and store loot in the terminal; Recall empties a robot so you can reassign or move it. Robots are useless without a placed terminal — even the free ones from Islandpedia stamps. This system is completely separate from the combat Mini Sentry Bot sold at the Exploration Club.
On this page
The Ore Locations guide maps the progression tiers where mining assignments matter.
Unlock and Craft
Progress Crafting with Zerine at the General Store: Senior Crafter unlocks the Worktable III blueprint, and building the terminal is treated by players and videos as the last or near-last Expert Crafter task. After crafting it, report to Zerine to finish certification. Once you are Expert Crafter, Zerine's store also lists the three robot blueprints.
The in-game item text describes the terminal as a command station for issuing orders to robotic subordinates. Recipes (from the wiki.gg Worktable III page, with TechRaptor confirming the craft list):
| Item | Station | Materials | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Robot Terminal | Worktable III | Perpetual Reactor ×2, Eternal Alloy ×4, Gear ×6, Chip ×4, Spirit Cube II ×3, Meteor Plank ×5 | wiki.gg Worktable III |
| Gathering Robot | Worktable III | Spring ×3, Eternal Alloy ×3, Spirit Cube III ×1, High-Performance Wire Set ×5, Lunar Crystal ×1, Chip ×2 | wiki.gg Worktable III |
| Mining Robot | Worktable III | Same recipe as Gathering Robot | wiki.gg Worktable III |
| Logging Robot | Worktable III | Same recipe as Gathering Robot | wiki.gg Worktable III |
You can also get robots before or without crafting them: the Islandpedia Gatherables stamp track rewards 1 Gathering Robot at 67 stamps and 1 Mining Robot plus 1 Logging Robot at 89 stamps (wiki.gg and IGN agree). Those robots still cannot work until you own a placed terminal.
Place the Terminal
- Place it from the equipment/build menu on your homestead, or next to a Moonlit Forest tent or campsite for forest work.
- Do not try to drop it on a raw ore node or cave floor outside a camp radius — forest assignments require a terminal placed within the camp area.
- To relocate a placed terminal, enter build mode (players report C on PC) and pick it up. Some Early Access builds could not enter build mode at later forest camps, so place carefully there.
Add, Assign and Recall
- Interact with the placed terminal and add robots from your inventory, the same way animals go into pens.
- Select a robot and choose Assign:
- Mining Robots pick a Moonlit Forest sub-region; different areas yield different ores plus ore chunks.
- Logging Robots cover the forest as a whole, with no sub-region split.
- Gathering Robots pick homestead jobs — official patch notes name regular crops, flowers, ranching tasks, sunflowers, seeds, and cicada products as separate selectable jobs.
- Leave them running — assigned forest robots work even when you are not nearby. Collect stored items from the terminal.
- Use Recall to dump a robot's inventory into terminal storage, change its assignment, or move it to another terminal.
Robot Types
| Robot | Official item text | Best-supported assignment | Weak or disputed use |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gathering Robot | Automatically gathers resources and crops within range | Homestead crops, flowers, ranch byproducts, seeds | Moonlit Forest forage (mushrooms, wild plants) — see conflict note |
| Mining Robot | Automatically mines minerals within range | Moonlit Forest sub-regions, chosen by ore | A complete per-zone ore table is not published |
| Logging Robot | Automatically cuts down trees within range | Whole Moonlit Forest | Homestead tree assignments are poorly documented |
Home vs Moonlit Forest
- Homestead: one terminal can run your daily pickup loop — crops, flowers, animal products. Players find ranch byproduct pickup the most reliable job.
- Moonlit Forest: place a terminal at each campsite you want covered. Mining Robots take sub-region assignments tied to different ores; Logging Robots handle the forest as a whole. Robots do not collect treasure chests, treasure maps, ammo drops, or zero-stamina wild plants such as mushrooms, and they can get stuck on objects (several of these Early Access bugs were addressed in official patches).
Storage, Limits and Known Uncertainty
- The Steam guide documents terminal storage of up to 100 item stacks, and Recall dumping a robot's inventory at any time.
- Not confirmed, despite circulating widely: a 12-robot cap per terminal and a once-per-day loot deposit rule both trace back to a single Steam comment. Robot blueprint prices are also unsettled — 55,000 Coins per robot type in a Steam guide and Reddit comments versus 45,000 in one April 2026 video, with no official price list. Extra terminal blueprints are reportedly sold by Zerine, but TechRaptor's Expert Crafter shop list names only the three robot blueprints.
- An unofficial fan site's Expert Crafter / Expert Farmer objective lists (deploy a mining robot, build a teleporter, robots unlocked via the Farmer line) are self-marked incomplete and conflict with the TechRaptor shop list — do not plan around them.
Robot Terminal vs Mini Sentry
These are two unrelated systems that players constantly mix up:
| Robot Terminal system | Mini Sentry Bot | |
|---|---|---|
| Purpose | Automation: gathering, mining, logging | Combat support |
| Source | Crafted at Worktable III (Expert Crafter) | Bought at the Exploration Club |
| Placement | Homestead or forest camps, then Assign | Deployed for fights |
| Covered by | TechRaptor, Steam guides, wiki recipes | IGN's beginner tips |
If a guide mentions "sentry" or combat robots, it is not about the terminal.
Troubleshooting
- My robots just stand around. Check that the terminal is placed within a camp radius (forest) or on your homestead, that the robot is slotted into the terminal, and that an assignment is selected. Farm robots were buggy in Early Access — official patches fixed several stall and wrong-harvest cases, so update before assuming user error.
- The robot harvested my crops but not the way I wanted. Official patches split gathering into separate selectable jobs (crops vs flowers vs ranch products), so re-check the assignment. Flower-exclusion is intended behavior, but players still report occasional mistakes.
- I got a robot from Islandpedia but can't use it. You need a placed terminal first — stamps hand out robots before the Expert Crafter terminal exists.
- I can't pick the terminal back up. Enter build mode (C on PC, per player reports) and remove it; some Early Access forest camps blocked build mode entirely.
FAQ
How do I unlock the Robot Terminal?
Is there a limit on robots per terminal?
How much do robot blueprints cost?
Can a Gathering Robot forage in the Moonlit Forest?
Is the Robot Terminal the same as the Mini Sentry Bot?
Do I need a terminal before using robots from Islandpedia stamps?
Sources
- OfficialStarsand Island on Steam (Opens in a new window)
- OfficialStarsand Island Steam news (official patch notes) (Opens in a new window)
- PressStarsand Island Blueprints Guide — TechRaptor (Opens in a new window)
- PressStarsand Island Crafting Guide — TechRaptor (Opens in a new window)
- Community WikiWorktable III — Starsand Island Wiki (wiki.gg) (Opens in a new window)
- Community WikiIslandpedia — Starsand Island Wiki (wiki.gg) (Opens in a new window)
- Player ReportSteam guide: Things Worth Noting (Opens in a new window)
- Player ReportSteam discussion: How do you use the gathering robot? (Opens in a new window)