Blocks

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**Blocks** are the main materials in Trailmakers.

Made from physical building blocks, each block has unique features like shape, weight and functionality. They can be broken off, refitted and used to build something new. Individually the blocks are fairly simple, but combined the possibilities are endless.

## Block types

### Frame Blocks

The main structural building blocks for your vehicles. These will make up the structure of your build, being both internal and external, aesthetics and frame. Be careful with placement, you don’t want to use too many and reach the complexity limit, or make it so there is a random 1x1 hole that cannot be fixed easily

### Propulsion Blocks

This type of block provides power or thrust to your vehicle. Some types of propulsion blocks include:

* Engine Blocks, which can give power to a land-based vehicle, such as Bulldawg engine, RAW engine and Dragon engine, ranging from low power, to higher power, with certain engines being heavier than others, and having different acceleration speeds.
* Hover Blocks, which are blocks like the hover pad, which allows you to float at a specified distance above the ground, and can be used upside down to become a wall-rider. (It can also be used in glitches)
* Thruster Blocks, blocks such as Mini-thruster, RAW thruster, Dragon engine, and more with the 1.6 update, these allow propulsion on land and air, only being stopped by the sea, in which most propulsion blocks, other than underwater-centred blocks still work.
* Propeller Blocks, which some of them are Propellors, Underwater propellers, Heli engine V1 and V2 (stackable/non-stackable), which all have their own functions.

In some game modes the amount of engine blocks that may be placed on your vehicle are limited by the number of power cores you have available. You can also limit these power cores in sandbox game modes from a range of 1-30, or not at all, same goes with complexity, being a range of 1(?)-700.

### Wheels

Wheels are used to help your vehicles move better on the ground. These can come in many shapes and sizes. Some may be only 3x3, while some may be 7x7, some are thin, some are thick, and they all have different grip on different terrains.

Go kart wheels or slim wheels (or landing gear) can be used on planes due to their small size or lightweightdness, while truck wheels or monster truck wheels can be used on grip-focussed vehicles, and may help making a multipurpose vehicle, although, aerodynamically? not the best. keep the speed to the lighter, smaller wheels
.

### Mechanical Blocks

Mechanical Blocks can move to give functionality to a vehicle. These can be used in simple ways, such as decreasing weight when needed, moving wheels left and right, adding suspension to a vehicle, or can be used in a more complex way. They aren’t limited to just that though, they can be used to make complex mechanical arms, make well-made battlebots that may dominate every battle, or even just combining them with logic, and allowing extreme contraptions to be made that can confuse new and old members of the game.

### Aerodynamic Blocks

Aerodynamic Blocks allow air to pass around them more easily, resulting in higher top speeds. These can be used as aesthetics to make the build more slick, using wedges to make builds look cleaner, or to make them more aerodynamic, or both.

There’s multiple types, like wedges (1x2 and 2x1 to 1x4 and 4x4), rounded (1x2, 2x4x2, etc), and corner (2x2x2, 2x1x2, 3x1x3, 4x1x4 and inverted corners for those). If you think you cannot fit a wedge into your build, or cannot fit a type of aerodynamic block into your build, you probably can by moving blocks around.

### Lights

Lights are used to illuminate your vehicles. They can also be used to decorate parts of a vehicle to make them look more dramatic, or to give off the effect of an ominous presence, or some form of higher being if used correctly.

There are only 4 designated light blocks that aren’t accessories, and they’re headlight V1 and 2, one being a bottom attack point, the other being directly on top of the connection point, same goes with twilight V1 and 2.

### Lift and Drag Blocks

Lift and Drag Blocks help lift your vehicles up, or push them down. This is how you make planes, and how you can also make things glide in the air.

There are powered and unpowered aerodynamic blocks for small, simple and normal tailfins, small tailfin are 2x2x1, making them easy to place, but may not be as great to use as the simple tailfin, which may be 4x4x5, and the normal tailfin. The normal tailfin is the only tailfin to have a 2x2 attachment point on top of it, allowing it to have extra blocks attached onto it. It is 4x4x2, which is the widest out of all 3. The powered tailfins are more aerodynamic, but require a power core each, while the unpowered aren’t as efficient in air, but are effective for saving power cores.

Wings come in 2 forms, small and large modular, one taking 2x1x4, the other taking 4x1x4, but each one being better in their own situation. The smaller isn’t as effective in air, but can be used to carry smaller planes into the sky with propulsion. Larger ones are meant for heavier and larger aircraft. Neither have a powered version. The 1.6 update brought more forms of wings, but their best experiences to figure out what they do

### Tube Blocks

Tube Blocks provide a modular system of tubes to use in your vehicles. Many people normally skip over these blocks, thinking of them as worse looking frame blocks, and ignoring them. They hold a secret block a surprising amount of people don’t know about. The only 1x1x1 block to exist in Trailmakers (to my knowledge), that has all 6 connection points as well, and uses no mods at all, meaning it’s completely vanilla.

### Balance Blocks

Balance blocks can make your vehicle heavy, balance it out, or make it buoyant. When first looking at these, you may only use the buoyancy blocks or pontoons, but the weight blocks are life changers, or even life savers depending on the situation. A build that may flip over every turn can suddenly becomes heavyweight vehicle that can push around tanks at its will (if placed at the bottom of the vehicle)

The buoyancy blocks allow you to just float on water, and using the actual buoyancy block, you can change between being a submarine and being a boat.

### Gadgets

Gadgets are various gadgets and combat equipment for your vehicles. This is where you now make a choice. Do you use the guns to make the worst possible vehicles, or do you use everything efficiently and possible make the best vehicle to exist?

There’s many guns, but many counters to it. This includes fighting with fire, and being a complete tank build with much armour. With 1.6, the airborne update brought a free targeting system, which helps with aiming, which can be turned off, or weakened, when wanted

### Logic Blocks

Logic Blocks provide output when certain logical conditions are met. Some may require little-to-no skill or knowledge, such as the Altitude logic block, or Distance logic block, or the Angle logic block, but AND, OR, XOR and similar logic gates are complex, and can only be successfully used by those confident in the field of computer science and logic gates. Be wary what you get yourself into, Trailmakers