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I dont think its good game design.

You don't think its good game design to experiment? oO

No its great! I applaud that this feature was thought of, and added. I also think Rimworld is excellent! overall. Its one of the few games (like Gnomoria) that i revisit every now and then to enjoy the new features.

However Tynan prizes himself as an experienced game designer, wrote a book about it, and has all sorts of thoughts on what makes a game good. And most of the time that clearly works out. But (for me) this feature doesn't work out. All the other events require the player to take precautionary measures, or to react quickly (for instance, treating colonists when an epidemic hit). This event however just blanket shuts off map outdoor access. That could be sort of fine (if unnecessary) if it didnt last for three months, like in my game. I think an unpreventable event that kills all outdoor life on a map is bad design.

Craftable, protective wear is an adequate countermeasure and would definitely be in line with how the rest of the game works

i guess its a matter of taste, but to me the event isnt appealing. I just had a toxic fallout last from june to september and counting, so I abandoned that game. It kills off all the trees, all the animals, and i get more and more colonists with extreme buildup - simply because they have to be outside sometimes for farming.

Staring at a green filtered screen for hours waiting for an unknown timer to end isnt my idea of a good time. With other stuff i can deal: eclipse? Batteries. Flare? Inconvenient, but its at least over quickly. Heatwave/coldsnap? Put effort into the temperature setup. Toxic fallout just seems unnecessarily long and tedious, forbidden areas or not. It detracts from the fun in the game. You can't do anything about it, prevent it, mitigate it... just wait it out.

Next time i get it, i will just reload when it happens. I dont think its good game design.

I think its a serious bug. I ordered one plasteel longsword, three dudes started one, one got finished, now i have 240 plasteel tied up in two unfinishable projects. No workaround seems to exist after an order is finished.

i think of it like with the diablo 2 skill tree, and how successful that was because you were forced to make choices. Random events only get you so far, i think mutually exclusive tech trees will allow for loads of replayability.

in Sword of the Stars 2 they even have random tech trees, meaning that apart from a few core techs you'll never know what you're going to be able to research..

If Tynan wants to do away with the turrets, I think that's fine. 

Just my own opinion though, I think we need better defences which still include the colonists to actively take part in the battle rather than just let expendable turrets do all the work, while the colonists sit pretty inside their homes.

E.G.  You could build a pill box type structure where the colonist can fire, but gains substantial cover bonuses.  Similarly you could build sniper nests, a watch tower that while flimsy, increases range and accuracy of weapons fired from it. 

Just my two cents.

id absolutely love to see anything mountable. Fixed turrets, pillboxes, guardtowers, cannons, etc

i like your suggestion and added it. I still think that - even if its rediscovery - it's a team effort. And the situation of being marooned on a desert moon requires its own social structure/tech, so that sort of stuff could be developed from scratch.

looking at the lone guy slaving away at the research bench i realized that what irks me about research in games is that:

1) all research items come from one source (some structure, bench, desk, room or building dedicated to research) with no regard for disciplines or methodology.
2) usually research can be solo'd, i.e. there's no need for any of the researchers to discuss or cooperate. This while knowledge production is - with the exception of Newton locking himself in his attic - an intensely social endeavour.

with that in mind i think research in Rimworld could be done more creatively and intuitively:

1) socio-political research items (concerning behaviour, morale, happiness etc) do not come from the research bench, but from (leadership) discussion groups. The governing attribute for this research is the social skill, not the research skill. Research goes faster if there are more people discussing an item, though it should plateau to avoid putting your 20 colonists in a room and steamrolling the techtree.
2) some of these research results could be mutually exclusive policies (with good and bad effects) that a leader or council can implement. Some colonists will be happy with this, others disgruntled. This can lead to internal political turmoil and maybe leadership change.
3) the social component becomes more important as tech becomes more advanced. The further up the research tree, the more scientists need to be working together on benches (or other furniture) within the same room. Other than just an increase in the amount of points needed for certain research items, certain furniture and a personnel quota is also required. This makes teching less straightforward and more resource intensive.
4) Either by locking paths or making costs increase exponentially, research should force choices on the player the further they go into the techtree. This will also stimulate players to replay the game a few times to explore different paths and strategies.
5) Random tech dropping out of the sky or being found in escape pods could open up otherwise inaccessible items/paths

This plan assumes that there will eventually be an extensive researchtree in place. I have no suggestions for the items themselves.

this is perfect and I would love to see more research options early in the alpha!

It seems like the existence of muffs alone begs them to be domesticated, so yes please!

Possibly Muffalo milk/meat has a positive effect on the colonists, but they have to be supplied with food and are targets for raiders?

I think water has always done very well as a factor in anything post apocalyptic/desert related stories. Itd be a missed chance leaving it out. It should be a finite resource (wells?) until tech is researched that can extract water from the environment.

Somehow Dune's windtraps come to mind