Starfield is filled with lots of randomized loot: the vast majority of spacesuits, helmets, weapons, boostpacks, and even starships you come across will be randomized. (I’m working on a separate article about how randomization works in Starfield—look for this early next week.)
But if you’re on the lookout for a unique, legendary (and extremely cool) early-game ship and spacesuit, I’ve got a recommendation for you. The best part is, not only do this ship and suit have great stats and a unique style, they’re part of a seriously fun quest called MANTIS. Thing is, this quest is pretty easy to miss due to how many new quests you collect at the start of the game.
Here’s everything you need to know to find this legendary spaceship and suit for yourself. Major spoilers for this quest follow.
How to find the MANTIS quest
A little wrinkle off the bat: this quest doesn’t have an exact starting position. You can acquire the MANTIS quest randomly by killing and looting “spacers” (basically, Starfield’s version of bandits). Most of us here at PC Gamer found it at different places and times on dead spacers, but you might find it during the “Back to Vectera” or “The Old Neighborhood” quests, or come across it while free roaming, as I did after boarding the space station orbiting the Earth’s moon.
However you stumble across it, you’re looking for a datapad called “Secret Outpost!” (I’m always sending emails like this, personally, hoping that one day they can become the basis for quest solutions in the apocalypse.)
If you want to experience the rest of this quest on your own (which I recommend) you already know everything you need to. Just read the datapad and follow the MANTIS quest arrow to star system Denebola, and land at the marked spot on Denebola 1-B. For more details, keep reading.
Lair of the Mantis
I recommend being somewhere between level 10 and 15 when you take on this quest because you’ll run into enemies that are sometimes as high as level 25. Luckily, the Lair of the Mantis is a maze of tight corridors which are great for stealth, and you’ll repeatedly travel downwards into the base meaning you have the high ground against your enemies, great for chucking grenades down onto them.
As you move deeper into the lair, make sure you loot every dead body you find, and look for an intercom on the wall midway through the lair. Some of the bodies will contain journal entries pertaining to the quest, and the intercom has a recorded message from the Mantis herself.
Solution to the Mantis floor puzzle
You’ll eventually reach a chamber with eight rows of letters along the floor and a number of dead bodies strewn around them. To avoid the row of turrets firing at the end of the chamber firing on you, you’ll need to walk across the letters to spell the correct word.
The hint to this puzzle is in one of Leo’s audio journals. He mentions his mother was fond of saying “sic semper tyrannis,” which is a Latin phrase meaning “thus always to tyrants,” or “ever thus to tyrants.”
Tyrannis is an eight-letter word, and there are eight rows of letters. To solve the puzzle and survive the trap, walk across the letters T-Y-R-A-N-N-I-S and you’ll reach the far side safely.
The Mantis ship, spacesuit, helmet, and boostpack
Once past the puzzle, you’ll have to fight a few more robots in the lair’s main chamber, but then you’re free to collect your rewards. The ship, called Razorleaf, is especially exciting because it’s one of the few you’ll find that has shielded cargo space already installed, meaning your chances of being detected while transporting contraband cargo are heavily decreased. The downside is it only seats two crew members and has a jump range of 19 lightyears.
The Mantis spacesuit, helmet, and boostpack are in a display case on a mannequin. The ship is in the landing bay. Here are all the stats:
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Repulsing Mantis Spacesuit
Chameleon: Blend with the environment while sneaking and not moving.
Weapon Holsters: Weapons weight 50% less
Repulsing: 5% chance to disarm nearby attackers
Armor-plated Mantis Pack
Chameleon: Blend with the environment while sneaking and not moving.
Liquid cooled: +25 thermal resistance. Armor-plated: -10% incoming physical, energy, and EM damage
Sensor-Chipped Mantis Space Helmet
02 Filter: -25% oxygen consumption
Hacker: +2 max auto attempts that can be banked while hacking
Sensor Chip: +20 accuracy while firing on the move
Razorleaf
Class A ship
Crew: 2
Fuel: 148
Hull: 469
Cargo: 967, shielded capacity: 160
The secret of the Mantis
So, what was the MANTIS quest all about? If you collected all the diaries and listened to the Mantis’s recording, you’ll learn the full story. A man named Leon inherited a secret base on a planet from his mother when she died. But his mother was no ordinary woman, she was a space crusader who called herself the Mantis. From the sounds of it, she became the Mantis to strike fear into the hearts of pirates and spacers everywhere. Basically, Leo’s mom was Space-Batman.
She hoped her son Leo would prove worthy of inheriting her legacy, so she challenged him to make his way through her trap-filled lair. He failed and eventually died (as did a whole bunch of spacers who also tried to raid and ransack her lair). The only one worthy of taking on the mantle of the Mantis is you. Congrats.
In fact, while flying the Razorleaf through space, enemy spacer ships may occasionally flee from you on sight rather than fight. The legend of the Mantis lives on! Give those spacers hell.