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Messages - fraz

#1
General Discussion / Re: RimWorld change log
March 25, 2015, 02:06:19 PM
I hope the new timetable system comes with mechanisms to encourage allowing your colonists to maintain natural sleep-wake cycles (e.g., by implementing penalties for nocturnal or highly fractured sleep schedules).
#2
Regarding clothing and weapon damage/deterioration, I think it would be great if functional deterioration did not begin until the items drops below 80% health. That is, a piece of armor (or whatever) retains its full effectivess between 80-100%, and gradually loses its effectiveness below 80%.

This would ameliorate perfectionists' (like myself) maddening desire to constantly replace equipment to maintain 100% effectiveness (which is impossible when clothing begins to degrade immediately).
#3
General Discussion / Re: Added power switch
January 18, 2015, 03:02:53 PM
I hope the power switch acts as a circuit breaker in the event of a "short circuit."

I currently rely on geothermal and wind (not solar), and avoid building more than a couple batteries, because the risks associated with batteries seem to outweigh the benefits, and I don't want to repeatedly build/deconstruct power conduits to manually connect/disconnect battery banks (too fiddly). If we can now build battery banks safely isolated by switches, I might finally make use of some solar + batteries again.
#4
Ideas / Re: What do you want in alpha 9/10?
December 20, 2014, 05:14:17 PM
As others have mentioned, I think a water system would be very interesting. There are numerous potential applications, but the core features I would love to see include the following:


  • Basic water collection and distribution infrastructure. Rain collectors, pumps (for pulling water out of lakes etc.), and pipes. Water heaters might also be required to maintain a functioning water network in below-freezing temperatures.
  • Hydration. Colonists require water. They can drink from naturally occurring water sources (e.g., lakes, ponds) or from fountains/spigots constructed as part of your water network. There could be a risk of illness associated with unclean water (e.g., from marshy ponds), whereas rain water or purified water (via a water purification structure) would be safe. A clean water supply is one of the most significant real-world challenges in maintaining a healthy population.
  • Farming. Crops require water. Outdoor crops in regions with at least moderate rainfall would generally receive plenty of water from the sky. Sprinklers could be constructed as part of your water network to provide water in drier climates or during times of drought. Hydroponics bays provide continuous hydration. I believe the farming system in the game would greatly benefit from stronger differentiation between indoor and outdoor farming, which rain/hydration considerations would provide.
  • Firefighting. The effectiveness of "beating the fire to death" would be significantly decreased, though still available as a last resort. If a nearby water source is available, colonists would instead carry buckets of water to combat the fire much more effectively. Perhaps sprinklers (mentioned above) could also function for emergency fire suppression. Perhaps we could even have a "fire hydrant" type structure, from which colonists could blast streams of pressurized water for rapid fire control.
#5
General Discussion / Re: Alpha 8
December 14, 2014, 03:48:06 PM
If anything, I think mental breakdowns are less punishing in Alpha 8 because of the new "release" option for prisoners. It's now much more practical to just arrest anyone on the verge of a mental break, get them feeling a bit better, then release them back to the colony (instead of having to recruit them all over again). I think this is an excellent change; it never really made sense to me that you had to repeat the whole recruitment process for your own colonists. Just be sure to have beautiful/spacious/well lit private rooms for prisoners so they don't have a mental break while locked up.
#6
General Discussion / Re: Why is there no wearout anymore?
December 13, 2014, 06:08:57 PM
In my opinion, it was more of a nuisance than an interesting gameplay feature; I think it was a good decision to remove it.
#7
General Discussion / Re: Parkas are seriously OP
December 12, 2014, 03:17:17 PM
As others have alluded to, I imagine the reason parkas were given such overpowered stats is because otherwise raiders/visitors (especially sieges) would freeze to death. I completely agree with the suggestion that campfires should have radiant heat, and siegers should come with wood to make campfires.

Frankly, if raiders/visitors sometimes die due to the cold, I think that's appropriate; extreme cold should be dangerous, and people who choose to play in such environments should be able to capitalize on this harshness as a defensive advantage. You know what they say about invading Russia during the winter...
#8
General Discussion / Re: Exploiting Heaters for Profit!
December 11, 2014, 11:54:16 PM
Quote from: _alphaBeta_
Another way to address the exploit would be for visitors to register that they're barred from leaving the map, and take that as a hostile action. This probably makes more sense when the diplomacy functionality has matured further, however.
There are potentially innocent (or even beneficent) reasons why visitors might end up temporarily barred from leaving, such as if they happened to be inside your base when an enemy raid arrived, and you lock the door to prevent colonists from wandering out into the firefight. Thus, I don't think it should automatically be interpreted as hostile. Perhaps being barred from leaving the map and suffering negative health consequences due to heat/cold/starvation while trapped could be reasonably taken as a hostile action.

Quote from: Mattorious on December 11, 2014, 04:17:58 PM
Yup, but this is quicker, and doesn't leave your colonists stuck inside your colony as long.
Quicker, yes, but it is not necessary to leave your colonists stuck; you could have a second entrance that you unlock once the visitors are locked in the trap room.
#9
General Discussion / Re: Exploiting Heaters for Profit!
December 11, 2014, 03:50:41 PM
I suppose the same thing has been possible for as long as we've had lockable doors, simply by starving them to death. Perhaps visitors who are suffering health consequences due to heat/cold/starvation should enter a "frantically leaving" state, in which they will beat down any doors/walls necessary to leave the map.
#10
General Discussion / Re: Parkas are seriously OP
December 11, 2014, 02:32:03 PM
I completely agree. Parkas make heating considerations irrelevant except for indoor growing areas. It's far easier and more reliable to equip all colonists with parkas instead of regulating the temperature of living areas. Surviving indefinitely in extreme cold just by wearing a parka is a bit ridiculous.
#11
General Discussion / Re: So, about turrets....
November 23, 2014, 02:28:23 PM
Quote from: Wex on November 23, 2014, 07:34:51 AMIt would be nice to see it as a vanilla feature though.
When I first began playing Rimworld a few months ago, I felt strongly that the game needed more turrets. As discussed in this thread, the vanilla turrets are rather weak unless used in an exploitative manner.

However, I have since seen Tynan make a few statements explaining his reluctance to add more turrets (and, in fact, his consideration of removing the existing turrets), and I have to admit I agree with his reasoning. At its heart, Rimworld is a story about your colonists' struggle to survive on a hostile world, and emphasizes the interaction between your colonists and their environment. Turrets are contrary to this vision, creating separation between your colonists and their challenges, as they reduce the need for colonist involvement in the defense of the colony. Turrets that can be constructed with all the same weapons as colonists would hugely exacerbate this issue, allowing for the construction of a fully automated defenses that don't require colonist involvement at all.

That said, I do believe the game would benefit from more defensive options. Given that our colonies are often faced with superior hostile forces, we need to have more effective force-multipliers (so that we aren't forced to resort to cheesy/exploitative tactics). This could include things like embrasures, trenches, barbed wire, fixed heavy weapons (that need to be manned), etc.
#12
Quote from: NoImageAvailable on November 15, 2014, 03:48:49 PMI have automated hunters killing everything that comes close to my colony.
How do you automate hunters?
#13
General Discussion / Re: To fluff or not to fluff?
November 12, 2014, 09:21:45 PM
Here's a reason to favor generic ("Assault Rifle") over fictional ("CAR-61") names: it allows us to assume that a given weapon designation includes a variety of different models. Based on the lore of Rimworld, there should be a huge diversity of weapons. Colonists, pirates, and traders would have brought weapons with them from numerous far away worlds. Other weapons may have been manufactured in the Rimworld's distant past, or scrapped together in the current hostile environment. I certainly don't want Tynan to create 20x as many weapons to reflect this diversity; in fact I would prefer that he keeps the list approximately the same that it is now. Instead, generic names can be used with an understanding that the names represent a category, not a specific model. Perhaps the new "quality" metric (mentioned in the change log) could further reflect this diversity within each category.
#14
General Discussion / Re: To fluff or not to fluff?
November 11, 2014, 09:40:56 PM
It's primarily the weapons' names that bother me. I think we have approximately the right number of weapons (I don't want a bloated list), and I like the predominance of relatively low-tech weapons. It would be nice to have a couple more Glitterworld weapons, and maybe a non-lethal weapon (e.g., taser), but otherwise I think the current list is sufficient.

However, it annoys me that the firearms have names specifically identifying them as 20th century Earth weapons. It's ridiculous to imagine that these weapons have survived thousands of years and been distributed across star systems. Of course it's entirely plausible for similar weapons to emerge on numerous worlds, but it would be much better to identify them broadly, for example "Bolt-Action Rifle" instead of "Lee Enfield."
#15
General Discussion / Re: i dont know if i like this...
October 06, 2014, 12:11:47 AM
It occurred to me that perhaps organ harvesting and transplantation should simply require more time. In real life, harvesting a kidney from a living patient takes at least 3 hours, and that's with a full surgical team and modern medical facilities. Harvesting a lung would take longer.

Requiring your doctor to devote much of his or her day to a harvesting surgery, thus taking them away from other productive activities (including medical care for other colonists), might provide a reason to not immediately harvest organs from all unwanted prisoners.