It's possible to get science - softlocked on Vulcanus.

[nicvampire]

Medium power poles are unlocked via researching Electric energy distribution 1 - a technology requiring red and green science. This technology is required to unlock Fulgora, and is not required to progress on Gleba, however, in Space Age, it's not required for the unlocking of rocket silo, and thus, you can get to Vulcanus without ever unlocking them.

And it's impossible to get wood on Vulcanus to craft wooden electric poles. The scenario of a newbie ending up like this is without the ability to research the power poles for whatever reason is very, very unlikely, perhaps enough so to dismiss this, however, this is a possible scenario.

[Brathahn]

if you manage to get yourself to vulcanus without power poles, you still can send some with your space platform

[nicvampire]

if you manage to get yourself to vulcanus without power poles, you still can send some with your space platform

Umm... no? Power poles aren't needed on the space platform, if you didn't load them in, and don't have bots to load them from Nauvis, this will not be possible.
There was a very similar softlock on Fulgora that was fixed recently, except that the missing technology there was the substations.

[Soul-Burn]

In past versions (pre-release) you needed satellites, which needed accumulators, which needed power poles.
However since that change, indeed it seems you can get softlocked on Vulcanus.

Considering a softlock like this was fixed for Fulgora, I see this similar softlock fixed for Vulcanus as well.

[Yoyobuae]

Also need Solar Energy research. Otherwise it's not possible to bootstrap the first power.

Absolute most minimal power setup possible in Vulcanus:

Screenshot_2024-11-05_12-03-34.png (547.82 KiB) Viewed 655 times

With only the required tech for Vulcanus discovery one has access to both chem plants and pumpjacks. But not medium power poles or solar panel.

Things change a bit if you assume there's a working space platform in orbit.

[nicvampire]

Also need Solar Energy research. Otherwise it's not possible to bootstrap the first power.

I thought of that too! Thrust engines can go without fuel, they are just really slow in that case, right? Then it might be theoretically possible to get a space platform up to another planet, just setup a bunch of turrets (no power required) and put the ammo in them manually.

[Brathahn]

if you manage to get yourself to vulcanus without power poles, you still can send some with your space platform

Umm... no? Power poles aren't needed on the space platform, if you didn't load them in, and don't have bots to load them from Nauvis, this will not be possible.
There was a very similar softlock on Fulgora that was fixed recently, except that the missing technology there was the substations.

well now you are moving the goalpost. first you said only power poles would be an issue. now you adding missing robots.
i wont call this a softlock because even if you land on vulcanus without power poles you can still research them.

"...but what if i dont have enough science packs and no robots and no power poles?"