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No bias here, I'm just curious what this community thinks of the present state, difficulty levels aside, of course. I'm also looking for specific examples of what you consider imbalances that need to be addressed. I might consolidate the provided examples for a 'most expressed issue' list to round out the curiosity.

I had a lot of trouble with diseases in the (i guess it was called) rainforest biome.
But i havent played that biome a lot, but in the period i played it, it was a real pain in the ass, everybody getting diseases. Haven't had it in the desert nor in the tundra biome (both in Alpha 14)

Maybe somebody who has a bit more experience with the "rainforest"ish biome knows if its too much or not compared to the others?

Quote from: Spudra on September 12, 2016, 02:09:09 PM
I had a lot of trouble with diseases in the (i guess it was called) rainforest biome.
But i havent played that biome a lot, but in the period i played it, it was a real pain in the ass, everybody getting diseases. Haven't had it in the desert nor in the tundra biome (both in Alpha 14)

Maybe somebody who has a bit more experience with the "rainforest"ish biome knows if its too much or not compared to the others?

I rolled a rainforest colony last night, and it is BRUTAL. Constantly getting malaria, sleeping sickness, flu, you name it. Makes sense in a rainforest setting, those places have historically been big disease vectors. But it causes serious mood issues with the pain and sick debuffs. I guess that's to balance the year-round growing season, a substantial source of wealth on a flat map.

I think the game is pretty well balanced. It's definitely not too easy, not by any means. I can reliably make it the first year on Phoebe Rough, after that it's in the hands of RNJesus. I think the tech tree is bloated and needs some work. Raid scaling should be less zerg-like; they should be bringing better equipment as the colony wealth grows but not mountains of men, it encourages killbox cheesing too much. If I ever make it to late-game in this Alpha I'll be able to provide feedback on that part of the game.

Very late game, the raids will sky drop right into your main base. With mechs.

I dunno, I never completed a game before. But right now some things are just so weird that it's impossible to take them into account (ie the things the colonists want are far from what you'd expect on a survival game, they are more like a bunch of hipsters whining about the environment rather than having actual food)

Yes I would say it is balanced. In fact, with all the new drugs I have not had more than a couple of mental breaks over several playthroughs, so maybe it's a bit too easy if anything.

Cassandra is still much harder than Randy because she will quickly reach a point where large attacks are the norm rather than the exception. Meanwhile, Randy will sometimes go for more than a season without anything bad happening, allowing you to massively expand your defenses or fully recover from a bad situation. Once things go south on Cassandra, you're usually boned.

After about 50 hours played, I'm still not entirely sure. I'm leaning on yes and no :P.

The main part I consider unbalanced is the recruitment of pawns.
As it stands, it's Way to hard to replace them. I love playing on Hardcore, but when you have four pawns and your only method of getting more is to capture raiders... That's not a good design choice, in my opinion.

Typically, playing at a hard difficulty on Hardcore, it constantly feels like luck is the deciding factor, with Very few ways to mitigate it. (Considering all it takes is two lucky shots from a pistol wielding raider, and you have two dead pawns and your save is essentially screwed. (Because even if, by some luck, you captured two raiders in the same raid, I generally get several raids in between recruiting even one of them. And that's with high speech characters.)

So yeah, some stuff still needs work.
It wouldn't hurt if they made the randomness of the 3 starting pawns a bit less... Random as well. It should be rare that you're completely screwed over from the start. Having to sit for 10 minutes and just press "next pawn" to find a few that can actually survive is tedious at best.

Just my 10 cents :P.

You can buy them from passing orbital traders or finding crashed escape pods.
I think 3 ways is enough to get more colonists because if they were *too* easy to replace the weight of losing them would not really mean anything. As it stands, especially in the early game losing a colonist can almost be game ending which I like.

Quote from: Zanzibar on September 14, 2016, 04:11:17 AM
After about 50 hours played, I'm still not entirely sure. I'm leaning on yes and no :P.

The main part I consider unbalanced is the recruitment of pawns.
As it stands, it's Way to hard to replace them. I love playing on Hardcore, but when you have four pawns and your only method of getting more is to capture raiders... That's not a good design choice, in my opinion.

Typically, playing at a hard difficulty on Hardcore, it constantly feels like luck is the deciding factor, with Very few ways to mitigate it. (Considering all it takes is two lucky shots from a pistol wielding raider, and you have two dead pawns and your save is essentially screwed. (Because even if, by some luck, you captured two raiders in the same raid, I generally get several raids in between recruiting even one of them. And that's with high speech characters.)

So yeah, some stuff still needs work.
It wouldn't hurt if they made the randomness of the 3 starting pawns a bit less... Random as well. It should be rare that you're completely screwed over from the start. Having to sit for 10 minutes and just press "next pawn" to find a few that can actually survive is tedious at best.

Just my 10 cents :P.

Sorry for singling you out, but these kind of issues are brought up fairly often it seems. And they are pretty much entirely wrong.

Quotebut when you have four pawns and your only method of getting more is to capture raiders...

You will get random wanderers joining.
You will get refugees being chased that will join.
You will get escape pods landing nearby that are easy recruits.
You will get downed raiders that are often fairly easy recruits.
The new recruit system actually increases recruit rate, if you are willing to wait a little longer between capture and recruit.

QuoteTypically, playing at a hard difficulty on Hardcore, it constantly feels like luck is the deciding factor, with Very few ways to mitigate it.

The game is not ruled by RNG. There are many ways to mitigate it: it is called planning ahead. The only point I would agree with is the new mood penalties are very RNG, but not enough to end runs without other mistakes being made.

QuoteHaving to sit for 10 minutes and just press "next pawn" to find a few that can actually survive is tedious at best.

If you find that tedious, then stop. 3 random colonists are always viable. Even the really bad ones.  :P


From my own view: Since a12 the games balance has been thrown entirely out the window if you play the game in a 'competitive' manner - to get the ship researched and built most efficiently. That part of the game went from skill based in 12, to luck based in a13, to entirely predictable cheesiness in a14/a15. It is a lot less fun.  :-\

Quote from: Britnoth on September 14, 2016, 09:10:27 AM
The game is not ruled by RNG. There are many ways to mitigate it: it is called planning ahead.

Yeah nope, not even close. In a recent game I had a Zzzt (a totally random event that is actually made worse by planning ahead with battery power) in my freezer, which exploded into a 2700 degree F firestorm that obviously nobody could get to without collapsing. Since this was in the middle of winter, on a map with almost no game to hunt, it was a dramatic but entirely RNG way to die.

Quote from: Britnoth on September 14, 2016, 09:10:27 AM
...3 random colonists are always viable. Even the really bad ones.  :P

Not a chance, if you get 2+ pacifists you're 100% screwed. The game is not at all balanced for anybody but the since-alpha-1 masochists who like to play on "cripple me" difficulty.

The game generally decides that at a certain point you get a certain event type, but what event you specifically get within that group is purely random. For example you could reload and get a different type of raid.

I don't really see a point in this.

Obviously things are not balanced and that is fine...It is a early access / alpha game. Things will be continually added, changed and worked on until it goes to beta. While in beta, things balance out until it is officially released.

Quote from: OFWG on September 14, 2016, 01:27:55 PM

Quote from: Britnoth on September 14, 2016, 09:10:27 AM
The game is not ruled by RNG. There are many ways to mitigate it: it is called planning ahead.

Yeah nope, not even close. In a recent game I had a Zzzt (a totally random event that is actually made worse by planning ahead with battery power) in my freezer, which exploded into a 2700 degree F firestorm that obviously nobody could get to without collapsing. Since this was in the middle of winter, on a map with almost no game to hunt, it was a dramatic but entirely RNG way to die.

Quote from: Britnoth on September 14, 2016, 09:10:27 AM
...3 random colonists are always viable. Even the really bad ones.  :P

Not a chance, if you get 2+ pacifists you're 100% screwed. The game is not at all balanced for anybody but the since-alpha-1 masochists who like to play on "cripple me" difficulty.

I just use the "plan ahead" mod, so I can custom-build my colonists. I like to make little roleplay setups for them, like a group of angry teenagers trying to colonize a planet all on their own, a "planned colony" with three families and a few single people, complete with animals, tons of supplies, etc, and then "accidentally" drop them into a biome they didn't plan for (ice sheet was a challenge), or a colony full of replicants who wanted to start a new life away from humans, so they're much hardier and have a more even assortment of skills, etc.

My current colony that I'm playing was an old guy with four young girls (he wanted to have a "harem"), but they murdered him before he could get out of his crytosleep pod, and so now they're on their own on a new world. None of them are terribly skilled (he brought them along for ther looks, not their brains), but they've managed to cobble together a pretty solid colony. They had a couple of other people join up, they have some cows now and a couple of random camels that wandered in and joined them, and living in a huge carved-out mountain with a huge walled courtyard outside.

The girls are kicking the planet's butt. :)

Quote from: Franklin on September 12, 2016, 01:32:11 PM
No bias here, I'm just curious what this community thinks of the present state, difficulty levels aside, of course. I'm also looking for specific examples of what you consider imbalances that need to be addressed. I might consolidate the provided examples for a 'most expressed issue' list to round out the curiosity.

I usually use the term balanced for PVP games, so I was hoping you would clarify what you mean by balanced in this aspect.

I do believe the current storyteller/difficulty settings/and custom scenarios create a good environment for a rimworld player of any skill level to enjoy.

I went with the "No, not really" option, though I don't really mod it for balance. It's still entertaining, but a lot of that is because of how hilariously bad and unbalanced some things are. Were the game advertised as being feature-complete and a lot of the balance issues were still there, I'd probably find the game a lot more frustrating than I do; Knowing that Tynan is focused on adding features and fixing game-breaking bugs moreso than fine-tuning the balance allows me to be a lot more philosophical about the frustrating aspects.

Personally I think there is a surprising amount that is unbalanced and/or needlessly frustrating. Some aspects of the game are really strong and work surprisingly well but others are not necessarily fun but difficult and are instead either fighting against the way the game works or being boned by something without warning. Honestly it's the first one, fighting against the game's frustrations, that bothers me more.

However ignoring specific event's or features lets look just plain at numbers. Most colonists get more upset about things like dirt on the floor or working in area with rock chunks then they do about their friends dying. Or for example, My sleep was interrupted twice do to medical emergencies and patient care and I am the doctor also that cute girl who is married keeps turning me down so I think I will go on a murderous rampage and or go outside in zero degree weather and strip naked. But how was your day?

Oh me, well my wife died, she was friend and also a fellow colonist and I spent the whole day cutting rocks in the dark but honestly this chair is so luxuriously comfortable I just don't care.

I don't have the exact numbers in front of me come on we all know there are circumstances like this that just don't sit well in your mind.

I wish I could explain the other thing I meant about fighting against the game but I don't know how to put it into word's and I fully understand I will be told I am wrong about all of this. But you know things like trying to force the colonists to cook instead of eating the raw meat or butchering an animal just to have a pet on the other side of the map who can't see you immediately claim the pile of meat you must set on the floor before cooking.

Quote from: DariusWolfe on September 14, 2016, 07:06:27 PM
I went with the "No, not really" option, though I don't really mod it for balance. It's still entertaining, but a lot of that is because of how hilariously bad and unbalanced some things are. Were the game advertised as being feature-complete and a lot of the balance issues were still there, I'd probably find the game a lot more frustrating than I do; Knowing that Tynan is focused on adding features and fixing game-breaking bugs moreso than fine-tuning the balance allows me to be a lot more philosophical about the frustrating aspects.

What sorts of things do you find unbalanced?

My biggest complaint is the trading system.  I frequently find myself sitting on giant stockpiles of silver and rice waiting for traders to show up with something I want to buy -- steel especially.  And since colony wealth is a major determinant in hazard strength, it gets annoying that the wealth I am accumulating is *worse* than useless -- does nothing for me but increases the danger I face.

Grass seems to always vanish from the center of the map over time, as its never replenished fast enough....

Quote from: mumblemumble on September 15, 2016, 07:14:47 AM
Grass seems to always vanish from the center of the map over time, as its never replenished fast enough....

Unless it's invading your farm. Currently playing jungle and weeds constantly grow over my fields. I think building a wall around them might have helped

Quote from: OFWG on September 14, 2016, 01:27:55 PM
which exploded into a 2700 degree F firestorm that obviously nobody could get to without collapsing.

~~~~

Not a chance, if you get 2+ pacifists you're 100% screwed. The game is not at all balanced for anybody but the since-alpha-1 masochists who like to play on "cripple me" difficulty.

1. Deconstruct a wall. Put out fires. Save as much food as you can. Not enough food after a single bad event? Should have grown more.

2. Tame a few animals to help protect you while you research. Then build some turrets. Hide behind them. Pacifists are usually good wardens, so you will quickly have 4, 5 or 6 people within a week or two. Stop blaming the game and learn to come up with solutions to your problems.

As for the poll:

I did not vote. Poll options are horribly biased. There is no 'game is now very unbalanced for competitive play, but staggeringly easy on vanilla settings and storytellers' option.  ;)

Quote from: CrazyCoco on September 15, 2016, 03:08:02 AMWhat sorts of things do you find unbalanced?

Off the cuff, raid scaling, mental buffs/debuffs, and diseases (though I haven't played much A15 yet, so maybe that's better)

playing longer time, imo past few releases are pretty much well balanced (as long You don't play Randy)

If i did not fckup early game i have to start again because game get's too boring and i'm able to take care of any situation since i have stuff well managed (it doesn't mean it's easy - i'm just prepared to fend of stuff with low chance of starting spiral downto doom of my colony)

Sure that some stuff would be better expanded (i.e CombatRealism combat system, storages, crafting in general) but it's ok and balanced the way it is.

Game is pretty complex and i like treating balance as a resemblance to real life so :
raid scaling has pretty much complex formula but basicly the more stuff You have the heavier raids You would have - ergo You sit on crapload of steel, plasteel, food, equipment, superior furniture, etc etc You get hell of a raids - kind of logical

diseases - let's say it's balanced as long as You treat pawns as rl - but i think that plauge might take a little more than 2 weeks for full recovery (running in full armor, sniper rifle and hunting elephants)

mental buffs/debuffs - hard to balance that (if You want to be as rl as possible) - still if You play right keeping mental heath of colonist on avg 40-60% is pretty easy (even without drugs)

There is only one path to win - manage colony according to circumstances. And even that might not always work. One time it might be 20 guys with sniper rifles killing all that's coming, other time might be farm of 2  pacifists with 80 huskies, grinding every raid thats coming...

Quote from: Britnoth on September 15, 2016, 08:28:41 AM
(snipped 'git gud' comment)

You're kind of making my point, there's always a group of masochists who think the game is easy because they've been obsessing over it since inception. See the Dwarf Fortress forums :)

In any case, that's not the same thing as balance.

> I just use the "plan ahead" mod, so I can custom-build my colonists.

"Prepare Carefully" is the mod you use. One who uses Prepare Carefully cannot observe the game as being balanced in any way. This mod is a trainer. I use it and many other mods, but as such this makes me personally unqualified to comment on the games balance at all, I'd say.

The whole point of the game is that it is stacked against you....

Quote from: CannibarRechter on September 15, 2016, 02:42:23 PM
> I just use the "plan ahead" mod, so I can custom-build my colonists.

"Prepare Carefully" is the mod you use. One who uses Prepare Carefully cannot observe the game as being balanced in any way. This mod is a trainer. I use it and many other mods, but as such this makes me personally unqualified to comment on the games balance at all, I'd say.

That depends heavily on what you use Prepare Carefully for. 

After all, you can get really awesome colonists just hitting that random button like it owes you money, or really terrible ones.  Unless you're using PC to make grossly OP colonists, then, it's functionally identical to just rerolling till you get what you want.

Quote from: OFWG on September 15, 2016, 01:58:04 PM

Quote from: Britnoth on September 15, 2016, 08:28:41 AM
(snipped 'git gud' comment)

You're kind of making my point, there's always a group of masochists who think the game is easy because they've been obsessing over it since inception. See the Dwarf Fortress forums :)

In any case, that's not the same thing as balance.

If the game is too hard, lower the difficulty. Stop complaining that the game is impossible (when it isn't) and ignoring the fact others want the game to be more challenging, not less.

AFAIK, Dwarf Fortress did not have a difficulty level system. Or a UI. Or antidepressants to take after trying to cope with said lack of UI.

~~~~

Some elements in Rimworld are pretty balanced: Harvestable crops all have their niche uses at different times. Melee and ranged weapons less so, but are still not 'unbalanced' in that there is no one obvious super weapon that rules all. Sniper rifles are perhaps the closest, but are not the best in every situation.

Then at the other end of the scale, we have land traders and drugs, which are so broken right now they let you ignore half the game. Make things to sell? Nah just pay for traders to arrive and murder them. Need food? Murder traders. Need components? Murder traders. Bionics? drugs? plasteel? AI core? Art? Murder traders.

What about working faster? Drugs. Run faster? Drugs. Dying of infection? Drugs. Doctor cant install bionics? Drugs. Poor mood? Drugs. Lack a careful shot to fight that siege? Drugs drugs drugs.

Did I mention drugs?

>  Unless you're using PC to make grossly OP colonists, then, it's functionally identical to just rerolling till you get what you want.

No. With rerolling, you have to make a choice between your personal time investment, or accepting colonists as-is. With Prepare Carefully, the personal time loss choice is not present. Anyway, don't get me wrong. I use PC.

A15 is balanced, yes, but I believe that things like the medical/injury system or the "food-finding mechanic" could use some polishing.

To the comments about preparing for a situation: Just because you can prepare for random events before they come does Not A: Mean they are not random and thus luck is not a major factor. (Which I am ok with for the most part.) or B: It does not change whether or not something is balanced.

What I mean is, if a certain event or feature were terribly unbalanced and so you prepared as best as you could for it to come... Does not mean that it is in fact balanced. With this line of logic all games are balanced because if it's not then react accordingly.

I think we can all agree that no game is balanced 100% perfectly and all though that would be awesome it is impossible. But I think a few aspects could use a feature to let you fight back against it. The issue with the ragging fridge inferno isn't that he could have a second a second stock pile or torn down the walls. It's the fact that meat frozen to zero degree's shouldn't even lit on fire by a shower a sparks. But what I think would make a better example is crop blight.

Yes crops are lost in real life but wouldn't it feel more enjoyable to be able to do something whether preventively or reactivily to deal with crop blight? Sure you could store food and medicine but when talking about balance and RNG lets keep in mind that one play through you might get to the point of great storage and some successful hunts and crops and then be ready for a blight but on another play through you could get unlucky and get blights right before your harvest so often you never seam to have any food to store.

To clarify I'm not complaining about the game being random, but if you claim it's not ruled by RNG. RNG stands for Random Number Generator.... Seriously this whole game is random, random colonists on a random world with random events. But it sounds like your saying shut up about balance and learn to git gud. Why? I love that the game is random and wish some aspects where more random, but some of it could use more balance.

I personally like the idea of having power fuses that you could research and use later in the game so random inferno's could be eventually mitigated against when it comes to using a power grid. On the other hand you could also use those fire extinguisher, popper, foam things. Either way yes the game is random and yes the other commenters are trying play well and mitigate against disaster. But no it's not perfectly balanced and discussing places that need improvement help us communicate with the designers so we can all have a better game.

Things that you have said :

"The game is not ruled by RNG. There are many ways to mitigate it: it is called planning ahead.
Stop blaming the game and learn to come up with solutions to your problems.
Stop complaining that the game is impossible (when it isn't)...]"


Ok, Ok, we get it... Stop sharing opinions on how we feel about game balance and git gud. Except that on numerous occasions you say it unbalanced as well.

"Since a12 the games balance has been thrown entirely out the window if you play the game in a 'competitive' manner"

"There is no 'game is now very unbalanced for competitive play, but staggeringly easy on vanilla settings and storytellers' option."

I don't think anyone here is saying remove all difficulty from the game, or that it is impossible and it's all the games fault. Nope just saying we would like some recruitment options other then capture / buy slaves and poof free recruit. And that some events are so spontaneous it might be nice to have a bit more player agency.

However.
To quote you again.
"If the game is too hard, lower the difficulty. Stop complaining that the game is impossible"

Well

If the game is too easy, increase the difficulty. Stop complaining that the game is too possible.

Also yes, yes, someone could bring up mods, alpha, early access. Well same goes to you. Mods can add difficulty and no one is saying we want a cake walk. Now is the best time possible to discuss balance and more challenge can be added as well.

TLDR: Game is random. Awesome. Sometimes too easy other times too hard. Awesome. Some aspects are spontaneous but predictable. I think more choice and player agency in events would go a long way.

Thank You for the read.

Quote from: Britnoth on September 15, 2016, 08:28:41 AM

Quote from: OFWG on September 14, 2016, 01:27:55 PM
which exploded into a 2700 degree F firestorm that obviously nobody could get to without collapsing.

~~~~

Not a chance, if you get 2+ pacifists you're 100% screwed. The game is not at all balanced for anybody but the since-alpha-1 masochists who like to play on "cripple me" difficulty.

1. Deconstruct a wall. Put out fires. Save as much food as you can. Not enough food after a single bad event? Should have grown more.

2. Tame a few animals to help protect you while you research. Then build some turrets. Hide behind them. Pacifists are usually good wardens, so you will quickly have 4, 5 or 6 people within a week or two. Stop blaming the game and learn to come up with solutions to your problems.

As for the poll:

I did not vote. Poll options are horribly biased. There is no 'game is now very unbalanced for competitive play, but staggeringly easy on vanilla settings and storytellers' option.  ;)

Thing is, in real life survival the colonists wouldn't be such pricks and have mental breaks about broken toenails and rooms not being to their liking. I don't think the game is unbalanced, it's just unrealistic for a survival game :).

Quote from: RandomGirl on September 14, 2016, 05:40:09 PM

I just use the "plan ahead" mod, so I can custom-build my colonists. I like to make little roleplay setups for them, like a group of angry teenagers trying to colonize a planet all on their own, a "planned colony" with three families and a few single people, complete with animals, tons of supplies, etc, and then "accidentally" drop them into a biome they didn't plan for (ice sheet was a challenge), or a colony full of replicants who wanted to start a new life away from humans, so they're much hardier and have a more even assortment of skills, etc.

I don't like such a mod. I usually do the rimworld equivalent of 'i'm feeling lucky' since I played dwarf fortress before and there it's perfectly possible to have a fun game with entirely randomized characters and location. At rimworld this is not so much the case, which is sad.

Turrets are OP. AFAIK, they're not considered when the AI creates a raid. I've got over 30 plasteel turrets and when pirates raid me, they usually send about 10 people, albeit some will be armed with rocket launchers. I've never lost a colonist to a raid. I just hide them in a room and let the turrets deal with them. Even mechs or 30-warg manhunter packs don't scare me. The most damage I received was two destroyed turrets.

> I've never lost a colonist to a raid

What do you do about the orbital drop raids when they land in the middle of your base?

Quote from: CannibarRechter on September 16, 2016, 12:44:18 PM
> I've never lost a colonist to a raid

What do you do about the orbital drop raids when they land in the middle of your base?

Ya know, I've been playing this game for 300 hours, and I've never yet to experience a drop pod raid. :p

Just a few hours ago though, I lost two colonists when a solar flare hit just as a 40-man tribal raid occurred. We held them off in the end, but most of my injuries stemmed from friendly fire! :D

Quote from: submarine on September 15, 2016, 03:36:01 PM
The whole point of the game is that it is stacked against you....

I feel like this comment sort of drowned in the complaints about specifics, so I think it's worth highlighting. If you actually read through the full description of the game on Steam or the official page, you will realize that Rimworld is intended first and foremost to be a story generator, where the story is created through the interaction between the AI and the player.
Whether or not you launch the spaceship and win the game is irrelevant. This is evidenced by two things:

1) the spaceship is a relatively recent addition. Before that, there was no ending.

2) the game never actually ends. When you launch the spaceship, the game will continue even if there are no pawns left on the map. Eventually, a wanderer will join.

Rimworld is a story generator, and it will continue to generate stories even if there is no player to interact with. It does not fit comfortably into any of the video game genres because while it has the framework of a traditional game, it's not about winning or losing but simply experiencing it. It sits a weird crossroad between a strategy game, the Sims and the sort of games that are usually refered to as "walking simulators" - narratives surrounded by a video game shell, but uncaring about the player's performance and interaction.

The unique selling point of Rimworld is that the story is not "canned". I was sceptical at first about the game's promise of emergent narrative (emergent is one of those developer buzzwords that makes my skin crawl) but I was quickly convinced. Rimworld provides just the right amount of the right kind of information about pawns that allows me to imagine them as human beings and share their ups and downs as if I was actually there. No other game I have played has done anything like that.

Quote from: Shurp on September 15, 2016, 07:11:19 AM
My biggest complaint is the trading system.  I frequently find myself sitting on giant stockpiles of silver and rice waiting for traders to show up with something I want to buy -- steel especially.  And since colony wealth is a major determinant in hazard strength, it gets annoying that the wealth I am accumulating is *worse* than useless -- does nothing for me but increases the danger I face.

As of A15, you can call friendly factions via comms console and request either a Bulk Goods, Pirate, Exotic Goods, or Combat Supply caravan to come by in a few days. It does cost from 300-600 silver though.

Ahhh, I forgot about that.  But the likelihood of a bulk goods cravan bringing 1000 steel is pretty slim.  1000 plasteel is even less likely.  It seems like bulk traders are the only way of disposing of serious silver surpluses.

I guess it would help to turn rice into silver so my freezer isn't so full.

So I gave it a whirl.  I called a bulk goods trader from a neighboring town.  The caravan arrived.  It's carrying a whole 107 units of steel.  Whoo hoo! :-P

This is ridiculous, I'm devmoding an orbital.

Quote from: OFWG on September 14, 2016, 01:27:55 PM
a Zzzt (a totally random event that is actually made worse by planning ahead with battery power) in my freezer, which exploded into a 2700 degree F firestorm

Yeah, putting that much battery power into a single power grid is a bad idea.  Nowadays I will only connect two batteries at a time to any grid segment and separate them with switches so that I don't get such problems.

I had a Zzzt in a conduit next to a sleeping colonist.  Ouch.  Good thing it was only two batteries.

Quote from: KnockTwice on September 17, 2016, 10:13:45 PM

Quote from: OFWG on September 14, 2016, 01:27:55 PM
a Zzzt (a totally random event that is actually made worse by planning ahead with battery power) in my freezer, which exploded into a 2700 degree F firestorm

Yeah, putting that much battery power into a single power grid is a bad idea.  Nowadays I will only connect two batteries at a time to any grid segment and separate them with switches so that I don't get such problems.

I had a Zzzt in a conduit next to a sleeping colonist.  Ouch.  Good thing it was only two batteries.

So do you have the batteries each connected to their own generators? Or can you connect all the generators to all the batteries and then on the power going from the batteries to everything else have them all separate?

Sorry I don't know exactly how this works but it sounds like it has something to do with the amount of power going through.

Quote from: delheit on September 18, 2016, 06:04:41 AM
So do you have the batteries each connected to their own generators? Or can you connect all the generators to all the batteries and then on the power going from the batteries to everything else have them all separate?

Sorry I don't know exactly how this works but it sounds like it has something to do with the amount of power going through.

Yeah, he's saying to split the batteries into 2 battery groups, and use a switch to turn all but one of the groups off at any given time. The switches connect all the batteries to the same line. It's a solid plan.

I use the below setup:

######
#****#
####+#
####&#
&----&
######


• #: stone wall
• *: battery
• +: switch
• &: stone door
• -: electrical wiring

...and the Switch is turned off if I'm not charging the bank, or discharging from it during an outage. I know I should probably cover my electrical wiring with stone walls, but usually the closed corridor also acts as a quick access to my electrical farm. I don't recall problems with this setup.

Quote from: delheit on September 16, 2016, 03:17:52 AM
If the game is too easy, increase the difficulty. Stop complaining that the game is too possible.

Difficulty level is irrelevant when you can launch the ship in under four days.

Quote from: Britnoth on September 20, 2016, 02:25:15 PM
Difficulty level is irrelevant when you can launch the ship in under four days.

I'd like to see that...

Quote from: delheit on September 18, 2016, 06:04:41 AM
So do you have the batteries each connected to their own generators? Or can you connect all the generators to all the batteries and then on the power going from the batteries to everything else have them all separate?

Sorry I don't know exactly how this works but it sounds like it has something to do with the amount of power going through.

Just avoid building so many batteries in the first place. I try to stick to one, though I haven't built huge mega bases. Conservation & fueled generators can carry you through eclipses easily enough.

Quote from: Britnoth on September 14, 2016, 09:10:27 AM
Sorry for singling you out, but these kind of issues are brought up fairly often it seems. And they are pretty much entirely wrong.

No problem! ;)
After another 50 hours played, I'm leaning towards agreeing with you.

Quote
You will get random wanderers joining.
You will get refugees being chased that will join.
You will get escape pods landing nearby that are easy recruits.
You will get downed raiders that are often fairly easy recruits.
The new recruit system actually increases recruit rate, if you are willing to wait a little longer between capture and recruit.

What I think the game somehow needs to make more clear is that pawns are more likely to join if you already have very few of them. It's most obvious when I play with the "Single rich guy" scenario. It's very counter-intuitive the way things are now. Looking at it with any kind of logic, pawns should be More willing to join if your colony is larger/richer/more well defended. But I can see why it would, for gameplay purposes, be the opposite. They just need a way to really show it.

Quote from: OFWG on September 20, 2016, 03:24:16 PM

Quote from: Britnoth on September 20, 2016, 02:25:15 PM
Difficulty level is irrelevant when you can launch the ship in under four days.

I'd like to see that...

https://www.twitch.tv/disnof/v/90144696 (https://www.twitch.tv/disnof/v/90144696) launched 1h 23m into the stream.

PS. He actually had a better map than I did.

Quote from: Britnoth on September 21, 2016, 07:12:24 AM

Quote from: OFWG on September 20, 2016, 03:24:16 PM

Quote from: Britnoth on September 20, 2016, 02:25:15 PM
Difficulty level is irrelevant when you can launch the ship in under four days.

I'd like to see that...

https://www.twitch.tv/disnof/v/90144696 (https://www.twitch.tv/disnof/v/90144696) launched 1h 23m into the stream.

PS. He actually had a better map than I did.

And here I thought I was decent at this game...

Quote from: CascadingDragon on September 21, 2016, 06:47:59 PM

Quote from: Britnoth on September 21, 2016, 07:12:24 AM

Quote from: OFWG on September 20, 2016, 03:24:16 PM

Quote from: Britnoth on September 20, 2016, 02:25:15 PM
Difficulty level is irrelevant when you can launch the ship in under four days.

I'd like to see that...

https://www.twitch.tv/disnof/v/90144696 (https://www.twitch.tv/disnof/v/90144696) launched 1h 23m into the stream.

PS. He actually had a better map than I did.

And here I thought I was decent at this game...

He's using a doctored start. Industrious and Neurotic combined make a pawn do work insanely fast, and Nudist is an easy joy buff to balance out the Neurotic break point. I'd be interested to see how long it takes with a pure vanilla start. Couple in-game weeks is my guess.

The start is vanilla. Anyone can reroll their starting colonists.

There's nothing inaccurate about calling it a doctored start. It clearly is.

There's also non-vanilla UI augments in there, which at the very least reduce otherwise necessary micro. Some of those definitely do get used during play as well, so it isn't purely cosmetic.

That's just the stuff that pops out within 30 seconds of skimming, could easily be more under the hood. That is not to say it isn't still impressive, it just isn't really vanilla.

[attachment deleted by admin - too old]

You can reroll until you get certain traits. That is just reducing the time taken to get the characters you want.

100% Possible in vanilla.

Events do not fire until day 5, so removing them had no effect on the game.

100% vanilla. (no idea why they are disabled still)

Those mods are only UI mods.

100% vanilla. Or do you think vein miner or priority haul are somehow cheating?

A doctored start would be editing the game to give you something you do not start with. Which it clearly isnt.

Any more lies?

Quote from: Britnoth on September 25, 2016, 06:32:57 PM
A doctored start would be editing the game to give you something you do not start with. Which it clearly isnt.

Any more lies?

Let's not get vitriolic over word choice, gentlemen.

Could you roll three colonists with the exact three same desired traits AND essential skills without using the scenario editor? Sure, if you sat there for several hours. Does knowing the shape and size of an exposed vein without mining it out 100% vanilla? It's clearly not. It's not like it's some enormous advantage either - it's purpose in the speedrun is to verify you have enough material for the ship.

All I mean is, I consider a pure vanilla start as the original Rimworld experience - the classic Crashlanded scenario with no mods, UI or otherwise. The scenario editor has perhaps challenged this notion. But to get semantic, my use of the word "vanilla" is deliberate. The game is designed as it is. If you mod any aspect of that design, UI or otherwise, it's not a strictly vanilla experience.

QuoteIf you mod any aspect of that design, UI or otherwise, it's not a strictly vanilla experience.

This is the same attitude I suspect you find with some players of Dwarf Fortress. They consider the games total lack of UI to be an integral part of the games difficulty.

They are of course, being ridiculous.  ::)

In case some of you are not native English speakers: If you say you have doctored something, it has the specific meaning of changing something in a fraudulent manner.

Accusing someone of playing a doctored start means he is being accused of editing the game save to add things he should not have, and attempting to decieve people about it. So please stop calling myself and others cheats.  :)

I would like to see this guy playing Dungeons and Dragons.

"Dude, why the hell your character has 18 in every single ability score?"
"Well if I would have infinite time to discard characters and create new ones I would eventually roll 18 to every ability. So I just took 18s to save time. It is not doctored start."

So if someone did have 18s in most stats, you would accuse them of cheating too?

Interesting.  ::)

Quote from: Britnoth on September 26, 2016, 09:30:37 AM
So if someone did have 18s in most stats, you would accuse them of cheating too?

Interesting.  ::)

Setting aside the point of using modifications to get Nth power improbable starts with minimal effort, where is the skill or challenge in using such a start to accomplish anything?

Speed running is all about breaking the game to finish in the shortest possible time, of course, but character creation is effectively a dynamic difficulty level. It's a decision that occurs before the game actually starts. So, what you've done is effectively set the game to "needlessly, super easy".

This game has difficulty set by, the A.I. story teller, the colonists and the biome...

I think the games balance is very good, getting on topic, but your settings really matter...

To doctor, simply means to alter or revise. It can have a negative connotation, but doesn't necessarily always does. I personally was using it something like definition #13 from here (http://www.dictionary.com/browse/doctored?s=t).

Dwarf Fortress is a game I play almost exclusively with the Lazy Newb Pack (a popular series of UI improvements and bugfixes for the uninitiated). I suspect that I'm in the majority in that regard, since unaltered DF is a cumbersome and ugly experience.

Nonetheless, I don't go around telling myself or others that I play "vanilla DF". That honor belongs to a small group of folks with a far higher tolerance for pain than myself.

----

I want to make it clear that I fully understand and, to a degree, support the use of the ease-of-use modifications within the context of speed running and streaming. Not doing so would be brutally boring to play and watch.

What I'm not supporting is calling that modified form of the game "vanilla". It is unnecessarily misleading, whether intentionally or not.

------

On topic, I voted for the second from the top option. There are a few lingering balance issues with things like buying awful statues that are worth considerably more once you turn them to scrap. Raiders also need to do a better job of altering between 'wandering' and 'watching for targets". The pure wandering status just makes them too easy to pick off without risk.

Quote from: Britnoth on September 26, 2016, 09:30:37 AM
So if someone did have 18s in most stats, you would accuse them of cheating too?

Interesting.  ::)

Gosh, this dude is actually gonna take six 18s with serious face. Good thing I never had such players in my parties.

Answering you question, I would usually call that player lucky one. Unless he tell me

Quote from: Supert on September 26, 2016, 07:48:08 AM
"Well if I would have infinite time to discard characters and create new ones I would eventually roll 18 to every ability. So I just took 18s to save time. It is not doctored start."

In case of that streamer you are fiercely defending by some reason, it is not luck. It is modified scenario.

Quote from: OFWG on September 14, 2016, 01:27:55 PM

Yeah nope, not even close. In a recent game I had a Zzzt (a totally random event that is actually made worse by planning ahead with battery power) in my freezer, which exploded into a 2700 degree F firestorm that obviously nobody could get to without collapsing.

Dismantle one wall on your freezer room, vent the heat to the outside, and your problem is solved.

Some of the challenges are more like puzzles you need to solve. Not a single random event ever has to be a base-killer on an established base; the big challenges happens when you get several in a row and moods have taken a hit.

QuoteGosh, this dude is actually gonna take six 18s with serious face. Good thing I never had such players in my parties.

I have rolled a legit D&D char with 3 18s before. on 3d6.

Also had a double 18s double 17s. Cheesy? Of course, but that is the point of a cheese speed run.

If you wish to disallow weighting traits using the scenario system to save us some time, then go ahead. I can still probably launch the ship before day 4 anyway with some heavy rerolling of starting people. This was just an exercise in seeing how fast it was possible to go, without having to do the same boring game 30 times before we got it right.

::)

Quote from: Britnoth on September 26, 2016, 04:54:59 PM

QuoteGosh, this dude is actually gonna take six 18s with serious face. Good thing I never had such players in my parties.

I have rolled a legit D&D char with 3 18s before. on 3d6.

Also had a double 18s double 17s. Cheesy? Of course, but that is the point of a cheese speed run.

If you wish to disallow weighting traits using the scenario system to save us some time, then go ahead. I can still probably launch the ship before day 4 anyway with some heavy rerolling of starting people. This was just an exercise in seeing how fast it was possible to go, without having to do the same boring game 30 times before we got it right.

Chances of getting Neurotic, Nudist and Industrious at same time is roughly 1 to 30000 per attempt not taking cases like Sheriff background. If you roll one character per second, you have to spend 20 hours to have 90% chance of such character generated and 40 hours to have 99% chance of it. Multiply it by 3 since you have 3 colonists. Showing us the case which is practically unachievable during a normal play is not the best way to demonstrate Rimworld balance issues.

Also, I don't care about characters with 2 or 3 18s. Characters with 6 18s are my single passion. It is not really polite to replace one extremely rare case with other not-so-rare case in middle of argument, you know.

Fun fact: If you use 4d6 Drop the Lowest character generation system in DnD and make one roll per second 16 hours per day, you would need about 35 thousands of years to have 90% probability of getting character with best stats possible.

QuoteChances of getting Neurotic, Nudist and Industrious at same time is roughly 1 to 30000 per attempt not taking cases like Sheriff background.

I wonder what the chances are of you reading what I post. Such traits are not critical to such a fast run, it just helps shave off that extra day or two.

If you think the run is invalid, I don't really care.

I doubt the game is balanced when you can reliably launch the ship sub day 10 with colonists you can get within a couple minutes rerolling,