What do you guys to against them, without exploiting the pathfinding ai?
Dealing with the crashed ships has become fairly easy after I figured them out. Usually I errect some sort of temporary barricade for my people to hide behind, with shooting gaps far enough apart to avoid their inferno cannons. EMP granades put them to sleep and the rest is concentrated fire.
When they can play out their range advantage, things get rough. They tend to clump, so mortars and grenades can be useful, but this is often not fast enough. Instead, I've come to use my regular troops to stall them until my bear cavalry is in position to flank them. They are actually quite reliable in taking out the baddies and more expendable than colonists.
Mechanoids don't make use of fortifications, so I have built a few small walls outside of my main pillbox so that I can have cover while I run EMP grenadiers towards them.
I have also found Frag Grenades very useful in dispatching stunned Centipedes. Scythers I so far have managed to just out-shoot from cover using multiple riflemen. The Centipedes were too well armored for that to stop them before the inferno-cannons opened fire and sent me scurrying.
Inferno Cannons fire slow enough that an EMP grenadier can just run up to the Centipede and stun-lock it for a while. Trying to kill it with bullets took forever though and it recovered and sent my gunner to the burn-ward.
The next Mechanoid attack, I used mass fire against the scythers. Was low on rifles due to an uncontrolled blaze that spread through my armory, so I substituted in some Great Bows, and they served well. When the gatling-centipede arrived, I sent a shielded colonist up front into a sandbag box to draw its fire, then I flanked it with two grenadiers (EMP/Frag), stunned it from behind a small wall, then grenaded it to death.
I've been playing a no-turret, no fortification game.
When i get mechanoid raids, i take down the scythers with concentrated burst fire while a shielded pawn behind a tree takes the enemy fire. When the centipedes roll in, its more of the same, but i have several shielded pawns running interference for each other on the inferno cannon centipedes, so that i not only have a backup target to take the inferno shot, but i also have a designated shielded pawn to extinguish the burning decoys. If i have time to prepare, i try to get a couple grenadiers, since grenades are amazing vs. mechs
On the ship parts, i take full advantage of the grenades. I position shielded pawns nearby on both sides of the ship, and ideally 6 grenadiers, 4 reg, 2 EMP, evenly split on the two long sides of the ship. I have the regular grenadiers manually throw their grenades, then ~1 second later, the EMP does the same. Usually the first grenade triggers the mechs, the mechs pop out and take damage from the other grenades, then are stunned less than a second later before their first shot goes off., occasionally i miss a couple mechs, that might pop out on the narrow sides of the ship, but the shielded pawns are plenty to buy me time for more grenade salvos, and a few ranged mop-up crew can concentrate fire on inferno centipedes before it gets too hot.
Tips:
leave 1 empty square between colonists for most ranged weapons, so that a miss doesn't strike an adjacent colonist. But when fighting centipedes, leave 3 empty squares between pawns so heavy charge blaster and minigun misses don't cause collateral damage. This is only important on the pawn being aimed at. Having a couple shielded decoys in front, bracketing a giant clump of shooters is perfectly safe, provided the shielded decoys don't get lit on fire (enemies will change targets off of burning pawns to the nearest NON burning pawn, which could result in suddenly having minigun fire sprayed into your crowd)
In my current game, i've lost 2 colonists in a 3 year span (one was a fluke scyther brain hit before i had personal shields), and have 14 active colonists, and several prisoners. The burns rarely cause lasting damage, and my obligatory nonviolent pawn is great for rushing in to rescue (he's getting bionic legs soon). The minigun/charge blaster damage is laughable is you don't group up, and the charge lances have a hell of a time getting through personal shielded pawns in cover.
I'm not big on the word games. State what constitutes "exploit" in your mind explicitly so I know the rule set we're conceiving.
There are lots of ways the pathfinding AI can be used to player advantage, and if you stripped all of them you couldn't play. So which actions are you banning for the purposes of the question?
Quote from: Limdood on February 15, 2017, 11:39:09 PM
I've been playing a no-turret, no fortification game.
When i get mechanoid raids, i take down the scythers with concentrated burst fire while a shielded pawn behind a tree takes the enemy fire. When the centipedes roll in, its more of the same, but i have several shielded pawns running interference for each other on the inferno cannon centipedes, so that i not only have a backup target to take the inferno shot, but i also have a designated shielded pawn to extinguish the burning decoys.
Which is much safer than hiding behind a fortification. It basically exploits the AI targeting the closest enemy.
I'm trying to get close enough (behind cover) the Scythers to take them out before Centipedes roll in. When there are only Centis left, I spread out my ranged guys (so that they don't get hit all at once) and proceed to charge them with my melee folks (shields if I happen to have any - please, make them craftable with reasonable amount of resources. I have a mod for them, but 100 gold and 100 uranium is WAYYYY too much to be able to sustain them). Meanwhile, I reposition my ranged guys close behind melees (so they don't shoot their backs).
It usually ends up with Centis being surrounded and beaten to death.
Exploiting the targeting AI of mechanoids sounds totally legit in my mind, because it's exactly how humans would try to fight robots. Fair/Unfair? It fits with my head-fiction, though!
If you have decent shooters (especially those with the careful aim trait) and decent sniper rifles, mechanoids can be dealt with relatively easily. The only real danger is scythers charging you but if you have enough snipers, they can potentially shoot it dead before it gets within range. If it does, simply have your snipers back off and they can continue to outrange it.
Psychic ship can be dealt with using a sniper rifle. It can also be dealt with directly, by placing walls and sandbags around and destroying them with concentrated fire. There's a third way, too. First, provoke them. Then damage the ship below 50% health, and run away. Then treat them as a normal mechanoid raid.
You need sniper rifles to outrange scythers, as survival rifles no longer outrange them. But a decoy wearing personal shield an a kevlar vest in cover will do. Kevlar vest and preferably kevlar helmet is important, because scythers, while having bad DPS, tend to destroy organs whole and can easily one shot you. If you use the decoy method, bring as many shooters as possible, just make sure the decoy is closest.
Once Centipedes are isolated, they are easy prey to survival rifles. A few colonists, 3+ equipped with survival rifles, will make short work of them. Survival rifles outrange ALL centipede weapons, just be careful to steadily walk back. Centipedes take many hits to destroy, but their speed degrades quickly with damage, so it's good to fight them on the move. Survival rifles deal damage faster than sniper rifles. Assault rifles and greatbows may also work, but your margin for error is smaller - it tends to take a lot of micro.
A single plasteel turret placed in the open serves as a wonderful centipede decoy. No centipede weapon can deal good damage at its maximum range, and 90% fire resistance makes it very good vs inferno cannons as well. Just make sure not to place the conduit very close so it doesn't ignite. If the turret starts taking too much damage, you can order a colonist with a personal shield to repair it and fall back.
Miniguns have the longest range of all centipede weapons, while heavy charge blasters have the highest damage per second up close (matters when you use walls as cover), and inferno cannons are the most dangerous to get hit by, because you lose control over colonist and he stops using cover. Inferno cannon is generally the most damaging centipede weapon from far away. In absence of inferno cannons, centipedes are easily fought from cover especially with a shielded decoy. So if they're advancing and they're close, take out the infernos first.
Just outrange the glass cannon Scythers .. there is nothing else ..
Against Centipedes I had great succes with luring centipedes into grenade range and have grenadiers pop in and out of cover ..
This is another job for trigger happy colonists btw. their reduced rate of fire makes them great grenadiers .. and its enough when a grenade lands nearby .. also grenades deal with multiple targets at once.
The only way to *not* exploit the forced inaccuracy of miniguns/heavy charge blasters is to intentionally put your pawns next to each other so the neighbors get slaughtered when the centipedes can't hit the pawn right in front of them.
I don't feel it's exploity to set up a barricade like this:
@ @ @ @ <--pawns
#x##x##x##x# <--walls/sandbags
And then just slug it out with assault rifles. Scythers usually miss and centipedes can't hit. I frequently walk away without any injuries at all. Just make sure to manually target the Scythers *first*, because they will blow your colonists apart if you give them enough time.
Quote from: Wanderer_joins on February 16, 2017, 03:30:49 AM
Quote from: Limdood on February 15, 2017, 11:39:09 PM
I've been playing a no-turret, no fortification game.
When i get mechanoid raids, i take down the scythers with concentrated burst fire while a shielded pawn behind a tree takes the enemy fire. When the centipedes roll in, its more of the same, but i have several shielded pawns running interference for each other on the inferno cannon centipedes, so that i not only have a backup target to take the inferno shot, but i also have a designated shielded pawn to extinguish the burning decoys.
Which is much safer than hiding behind a fortification. It basically exploits the AI targeting the closest enemy.
nearly everything in this game is an "exploit" if you define exploit as taking advantage of how the game works....mortars take advantage of range and threat response, snipers - same thing, personal shields take advantage of targeting mechanics, traps and IEDs take advantage of player foreknowledge or pathing, same with well-positioned grenadiers ahead of time, spacing pawns abuses the forced miss chance of spread weapons
In fact, why don't you tell me what YOU use and i'll take a dump on that and tell you how you're abusing mechanics to make the game EZ mode?
Quote from: Limdood on February 16, 2017, 09:12:42 AM
you define exploit as taking advantage of how the game works
I would change "taking advantage of" for "abusing", but yes, it's the idea.
Since it is an issue, I'm mostly concerned about the choke point exploit that many people seem to use. It's the most used and extremely effective, though I've seen a screenshot where the entire base is some sort of bunker, wich seems more legit to me. Not that I'm criticising anyone, it just breaks some of the immersion for me.
Quote from: Wanderer_joins on February 16, 2017, 10:28:01 AM
Quote from: Limdood on February 16, 2017, 09:12:42 AM
you define exploit as taking advantage of how the game works
I would change "taking advantage of" for "abusing", but yes, it's the idea.
"Abusing" means nothing in this context. You need to pin down a definition of where you draw the line or you might as well say you don't want to "ychterstile" the game. If ychterstile is a moving target the discussion isn't meaningful.
State your rules.
QuoteSince it is an issue, I'm mostly concerned about the choke point exploit that many people seem to use. It's the most used and extremely effective, though I've seen a screenshot where the entire base is some sort of bunker, wich seems more legit to me. Not that I'm criticising anyone, it just breaks some of the immersion for me.
Chokes are much more effective against standard raids. They can still work against mechs and help against scythers (they're kind of bad vs centipedes compared to bog-standard kiting) but aren't the optimal method usually.
But in practice, how is a choke point "worse" than using a wall, peeking around to shoot the scyther, hiding before it can return fire (many weapons can do this), then waiting until it stops "waiting for targets" to shoot again? If you do that it is possible to constantly shoot the mechs without them returning fire, and that's before we get into personal shields to draw fire.
With similar or identical outcomes or practical risk and arguably more cost for the "exploitative" behavior (turrets actually cost power and more resources), what is the rationale for saying one thing is an "exploit" while another thing is not an exploit?
"taking advantage of": 1 trap
"abusing": 10 traps
Since drawing the line is subjective players usually say: no trap
Quote from: Wanderer_joins on February 16, 2017, 11:33:31 AM
"taking advantage of": 1 trap
"abusing": 10 traps
Since drawing the line is subjective players usually say: no trap
If you ban traps, turrets, cover/targeting algorithms, kiting, etc you ban playing the game.
What I'm looking for is self-consistent rationale as to why one tactic is okay and not another.
For example, you can 100% all centipedes forever using kiting. That's 10x. That fits your definition of "abuse". Or is this abuse okay for some reason other abuse is exploitative?
If you're just looking for some kind of variant play just say so, but I suspect that isn't the motivation when saying "no exploits".
I would draw the line between Tactics that are used and work IRL between Tactics that work ingame because of mechanics.
Using choke points, cover and advanced range is in IRL often refered to as "not being stupid"
Even Kiting a Larger enemy falls into that category. But this is the point where we should start to divide between "would this work in IRL" .. against stupid enemies .. sure.
Against Killer Machines from the futere .. maybe not .. so the machines need tactics available to counter this .. which would call for different types of ai behavior for different types of enemies .. which there should be in the future of this game.
Quote from: TheMeInTeam on February 16, 2017, 11:37:06 AM
I suspect that isn't the motivation when saying "no exploits".
I'm just saying "no turrets" or "no traps" doesn't mean "no exploits". Game mechanics is what it is, and i love playing this game. But the more advanced you're in this game, the more rules you've to impose yourself to keep it challenging.
Quote from: SpaceDorf on February 16, 2017, 11:50:59 AM
I would draw the line between Tactics that are used and work IRL between Tactics that work ingame because of mechanics.
Using choke points, cover and advanced range is in IRL often refered to as "not being stupid"
Even Kiting a Larger enemy falls into that category. But this is the point where we should start to divide between "would this work in IRL" .. against stupid enemies .. sure.
Against Killer Machines from the futere .. maybe not .. so the machines need tactics available to counter this .. which would call for different types of ai behavior for different types of enemies .. which there should be in the future of this game.
If you draw the IRL line without further explanation, your conclusion is not to play Rimworld. The game intentionally deviates from reality, a lot, even factoring the sci fi aspects...and it does so in the name of gameplay. I consider that a good choice, but would be okay as long as the game is self-consistent.
@ wanderer joins:
Fair enough. Taking stuff away from yourself to add challenge or look at the game a new way is a reasonable move.
What isn't fair is to weight tactics using criteria unevenly such that the same outcome with the same risk and same resource usage would get graded out as substantially more/less cheap. OP's request is fishy, because it tends to result in this kind of outcome.
And here I was thinking that my post did just that ..
Quote from: SpaceDorf on February 16, 2017, 01:01:09 PM
And here I was thinking that my post did just that ..
"Would this work IRL" in the context of a game that ignores physics and has enemies that don't exist is not a particularly useful measure.
IRL, an assault rifle could shoot across the entire map, and a good shooter wouldn't have much trouble hitting people at a higher % than you see at ~31 tiles right now. What in-game tactic would work against rifles that shoot lethal rounds across the map with high accuracy? Not many. It's not a useful consideration.
An exploit is a tactic that relies on in-game simulation mechanics which would not be applicable in the situations which the game is trying to simulate with those mechanics.
To illustrate with an exaggerated example, consider embrasures in Combat Realism. They're only supposed to work like better sandbags - stopping something like 90% of bullets - but wall up something completely in embrasures and it breaks targeting code entirely, such that enemies will never fire back because they only search for things they can path to.
Using embrasures for cover is not an exploit. Using embrasures to break targeting is.
As applied to mechanoids, consider situations where you can do something "because you know that's how it works." You can safely wall up a psychic ship except for a line of IEDs because you know ships only trigger when damaged. You can dance a shielded pawn around a centipede while your peanut gallery safely stands in the open firing on it because you know it'll only target the closest pawn. You can build elaborate deadfall corridors because you know they'll always prefer to path through open terrain.
Used appropriately to gain the upper hand, all of these are fair strategies. Used to the fullest that the game mechanics will allow, all of these are exploits. The line between the two is largely up to personal preference. Some players will happily IED psychic ships to nothing. Some can't play with embrasures at all because they're literally unable to not wall themselves in with them. But the line IS there.
The same tactics that are described against scythers and centipedes.
Either outrange the shooter with a better rifle.
Cover and visibility .. which will seriously affect the shooter.
Fake targets.
Make him go a prepared path you want him to go ..
Flank him out of hiding with your weapon of choice.
Tactics are implementations of proven techniques, the use of terrain and knowledge of your surroundings to gain the upper hand against an opposing force.
No matter what the enemy actually is ..
So your example with the shooter and the IRL Rifle is moot. Because in IRL you have ways to deal with this guy. And I just remembered .. that ingame event you describe is called a siege using mortars .. except .. the mortars would hit ..
What I admit that I did wrong is, that I did not specify Tactics that work only in Rimworld because of the games engine.
Hmmm .. the only thing I can think of is hiding in a wooden house, and the centis try to knock down the door instead just shooting the house down ..
-- EDIT --
Thanks Derp for being faster and more knowledgable in Rimworld Exploity stuff than me :)
(http://wstaw.org/m/2017/03/04/intercepted_png_750x750_q85.jpg)
This image shows where I defeated 3 inferno centipedes in melee without getting a single wound. They were crawling from the east to west along the upper half of the picture. I ambushed them well outside of the base, as you can see parts of it are still made out of wood.
I irritated centipedes with a personal shield wearing guy just on the edge of their vision. First, one centipede stopped to fire at him, splitting from the pack. Norman, triggerhappy, quickly rushed from the other side with EMP grenades. As soon as the first grenade was about to hit, several of my colonists and war beasts attacked in melee (most without shields). Then I just kept chucking EMP grenades and after a minute of bashing it was down.
Then I had to attack two centipedes at the same time. I used the same shielded colonist to keep their attention, while Norman crept out from behind the rock in the center of the picture. Then they tried to target her, but the triggerhappy EMP thrower was faster. Both centipedes were bashed to bits by a group of angry tribals, wolves and bears.
For anyone wondering, 'Adapted' doesn't help mechanoids much if you keep throwing those EMP grenades. Norman spammed so much I don't think any centpipede managed to attack in melee even once. Overall, it was surprisingly effective and the impact of EMP grenades was dramatic. And other than devilstrand I managed to harvest in first year, my equipment was substandard. Looted deadman kevlar vests, helmets, steel spears, gladius, maybe 1 mace.
You definitely don't need kiting or better range to destroy mechanoids.
If you have EMP, you don't
My tribe still has not a single emp weapon .. so kiting it is.
Scythers are killable in melee, especially if you make animals go first. If you have an old kevlar vest, and some leather dusters maybe you will only lose a jaw. Or nothing, just some wounds to treat. Really, no kiting required to melee 2 scythers. But centipedes are terrifying in melee, incredible toughness and high BLUNT damage. Nothing really protects against blunt.
You would think Parkas should provide a lot of blunt resistance.
I'm personally of mixed opinion as to how much of an exploit "Shielded Decoys" are for fighting Mechanoids. On the one hand, you can wind up defeating them with nearly zero injuries, but on the other you are also constantly skirting on the edge of disaster. Close-range lucky hit overloads the shield? You're in for a world of hurt.
I can provide a story-based justification that this is nice and thematic with crafty humans out-witting dumb robot by exploiting their targeting routines, but the fact that this works on human raiders too is a bit of a problem.
More importantly, it's way too much micro-management for my tastes. Especially when it is unnecessary. Just build some walls and sandbags to take cover behind and you can usually win a straight-up shootout with minimal injuries. But make sure to target the scythers first... if you let them keep shooting at you you're going to lose a lot of arms and legs.
Cover does work, except when the number of centipedes is 3 and they all have inferno cannons. They're literally designed to handle enemies in cover.
Personal Shields seem to prevent pawns from getting set on fire, since they take no damage from the Inferno Cannon blast.
Quote from: Hans Lemurson on March 05, 2017, 08:59:43 AM
Personal Shields seem to prevent pawns from getting set on fire, since they take no damage from the Inferno Cannon blast.
Yes, but not infallibly so. When I teased the centipedes, most of their shots were misses because of the slow moving projectile. In my scenario maybe Worm would take one or two hits, but that would be the end of it in the entire firefight. And yes he was wearing the only power armor helmet in my colony.
Quote from: b0rsuk on March 05, 2017, 08:56:07 AM
Cover does work, except when the number of centipedes is 3 and they all have inferno cannons. They're literally designed to handle enemies in cover.
Inferno cannon proof cover:
P P P P
#=##=##=##=# P - Pawn = - sandbag # - Wall
C C C
Centipedes have awful aim. So if the shot strays to the right or left it hits a wall, which blocks the flame from all pawns. Save. If the shot goes over the pawn's head make sure you have room behind. It explodes behind, usually missing all your pawns but sometimes giving a light burn to one or two.
Without walls, yeah, inferno cannons will turn your colonists into crispy chicken.