[i]The following contains a great deal of information pertaining to the Barkman missions, key locations, information on the opponents, and additional information. Knowledge is power!
After having acquired a NeoTroy and equipping it with a second secondary weapon (some sort of plasma cannon for the chest plate, but looks more like a flame thrower), and after enhancing all three weapons to level 6 (as high as I could, until I get me more blue crystals), I set forth to the Ganymede (or whatever it's called) Gate.
There's two of those gates, located NNW and NW of the main Colony Base (if you are playing as UIFSS). I went into the one NNW of the Base, as it seemed closer.
With this gate, there seems to be a long load time. a looooooooooooooooong load time, which I, quite frankly, cannot understand, as there doesn't to be any more enemies here than any other part of the system... also, there are less people here, so there isn't an issue with over crowding. You will emerge from the Northern Space Gate.
As soon as you finish loading, you will be attacked by a Barkman Pirate. They are using a shoulder mounted machine gun of sorts, as well as a lightsabre, err, a glowing energy sword.
My Neo is a level 25 mech, and is equipped with level 23 gear, and the energy sword used by the Pirates will go through your shielding with little difficulty; I am able to take down a group of 2-3 Pirates without having to run and hide to recharge.
But anyway... you will be attacked as soon as you step through. A bit of a warning: it's hard to target that first one attacking you. You will have to move out of the gate's area of effect in order to successfully target your opponent. If you remain in the area, there is a good chance you may activate the gate and be sent back into Jupiter space. (and then suffer the load time all over again).
Going through this particular dungeon is easy enough; the enemy is spaced far enough apart where you can wander about without coming into direct contact (unlike fighting the space jellyfish things in Jupiter space), and is fairly simple to pick off a Pirate here and there if you wish. Also, there are plenty of gaps where you can sit your mech and wait for your shields to recharge, which is quite useful for those of us who don't bring along any replenishment packs.
A Rusty Barkman Pirate will drop: 3 Metal, 3 Ither, and 5 Gas. Right now, I do not know how many experience points you get from each kill; I'll check on that later, as I am currently performing a harvest here. Anyway, if you are performing the level 18 quest "Defeat Planet Remnants", the Barkman units will also drop a Rusted Barkman armor piece, seven of which are required to complete the quest. Completion of this quest gives you 500 gold and 3500 experience points.
There is an additional quest that can be completed in this gate. Also a level 18 quest, it is called "Exploration Request from Headquarters". This quest, when completed, will give you 2000 gold and 12000 experience points. This area can be found in the SE quarter of the Barkman map, and is easily identifiable as a pinkish pyramid. There is a way to get to this base and only having to kill one Pirate! I pretty much traveled
in a SSE direction, clicking my movements instead of clicking the map and auto-flying there... at one point, you fly due S, and kill the mech that is on the destination site. To complete this quest, you will have to do some harvesting; just like other harvest sites, you will have to answer a question There is a Southern Space Gate located right by this area, and is probably connected to that Gate in Jupiter space I mentioned earlier, the one located NNW of the Colony Base. I haven't checked it out to see if that is so, but if it is, I would think there would be a greater collection of Barkman Pirates by it upon entering.
Located in the topmost portion of the SW quarter of the Barkman map, you will see a base.a Greyish structure, when the mouse is moved atop it, will read "Barkman's Secret Base". This is a dungeon similar to the one in Jupiter space that sends training mechs after you, except you have to journey through it to get to the end. I'd advise a party to go through, or at least come prepared with some replenishment packs.
