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I only dusted off my Kickstarter in Alpha9, but I can see myself playing this game in the future. Like Dwarf Fortress, but better interface, somewhat reduced micromanagement and more game (as opposed to simulation for its own sake). I see a lot of stuff added in each alpha's changelog - not "15 new kinds of food/weapons", but whole new systems. That's impressive. There's attention to detail, nice music, sounds and visual effects.

Are there any reasons not to put multiple workshops in a single big room ? For example are researchers bothered by a cook or a stonecutter ? Is the only limitation logistics - like having a stonecutter close to a stone stockpile, or cook near a fridge ? I don't think people in medical beds count as sleeping , so I could put them in near research tables, sculptors, etc. As far as I know the only activity that is bothered by people going by is sleep - "disturbed sleep" thought.

Revenge of the Titans (a variant of Tower Defence) has enemies which are very good at avoiding turrets. Some, but not all, go out of their way to reach your base by walking around the turrets. There also might be some kind of algorithm at work which makes enemies avoid places where many die.

I hope Rimworld won't degenerate into a Tower Defence games. I mean, killboxes should be fairly effective against predictable enemies, but perhaps 60% of the time, not 100% of the time. I've seen the game called "real-time X-COM". That's something. Compared to another TD.

Mountain  bases in real life are very hard to breach, but also isolated. And they don't have fields, there's no room for fields.

It would be helpful to have human-controlled "drones", or robots which can fight somewhat effectively (for example limited to pistols and melee weapons), but need to be controlled remotely. There would be a "military console" object, where colonists with peg legs and veterans can contribute to defense. A drone would fall fairly quickly under fire, and have a not insignificant cost (80 steel?).

Blights don't do much to fast-growing crops, but they really devastate Xerigium, not to mention Devilstrand. There are already mechanisms which encourage plant diversity - fine meals, lavish meals. But blights are not one of them, they destroy everything no matter how you plant.

The ships are also only a placeholder, until Tynan gets to making a more permanent and logical trading system.

Thanks, that's reassuring.

[Minimum viable population]

Minimum viable population
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimum_viable_population

is a lower bound on the population of a species, such that it can survive in the wild. This term is used in the fields of biology, ecology, and conservation biology. More specifically, MVP is the smallest possible size at which a biological population can exist without facing extinction from natural disasters or demographic, environmental, or genetic stochasticity.
(...)
Minimum viable population is usually estimated as the population size necessary to ensure between 90 and 95 percent probability of survival between 100 to 1,000 years into the future. The MVP can be estimated using computer simulations for population viability analyses (PVA). PVA models populations using demographic and environmental information to project future population dynamics. The probability assigned to a PVA is arrived at after repeating the environmental simulation thousands of times.

For example, for a theoretical simulation of a population of fifty giant pandas in which the simulated population goes completely extinct, thirty out of one hundred stochastic simulations projected one hundred years into the future are not viable. Causes of extinction in the simulation may include inbreeding depression, natural disaster, or climate change. Extinction occurring in thirty out of one hundred runs would give a survival probability of seventy percent. In the same simulation with a starting population of sixty pandas, the panda population may only become extinct in four of the hundred runs, resulting in a survival probability of 96 percent. In this case the minimum viable population that satisfies the 90 to 95 percent probability for survival is between 50 and 60 pandas. (These figures have been invented for the purpose of this example.)

What's the minimum viable population for humans ? I've seen various numbers thrown around, but they were between 300 and 1000.

Having to wash, use toilet would increase colony micromanagement. Suddenly you'd have to solve toilet bottlenecks and set toilet priorities in Overview.

I like water tanks for drinking and maybe watering fields, but but again you'd have to make sure colonists have stuff to drink, and don't miss their drink. Humans need to drink more often than eat, and colonists already eat about once a day. What about long expeditions for wood etc ? Implement canteens ?

trait - Afraid of darkness
The character gets increased penalty from being in the dark, and IS bother by dark bedrooms. Maybe the fear should be higher for being outdoors in the dark ?("What was that noise ? Can someone check it out ?")
trait - Outdoorsman (is less bothered by sleeping / working outdoors and in the weather. Gets a mood penalty for being indoors.)

How about characters walking slower in dark indoors ? You could also add a new trait - "afraid of darkness".

If the idea is to make Melee combat possible, how about smoke grenades ? Reducing vision and ranged accuracy. Smoke grenades (or EMP) would also temporarily disable turrets. Less emphasis on kill boxes, less Tower Defence.

Careful here - won't this idea increase micromanagement ? You can use materials which are less flammable, especially for bulkhead doors. You can put batteries indoors.

Yes, I would like to see this too. Maybe not blights that affect a single crop, but blights that affect 50-80% of crop types. What's the point of diversifying your crops if a single event will nuke them all ? Also, some crops take long to mature. Xergium is an example, it's supposed to be an alternative to medkits, but it's getting hit by the same stick as regular plants.

I haven't watched Firefly, but it still bothers me there are so many people around. It feels like someone is visiting my settlement every few minutes. Apparently you can make big profit by trade, but you can't use those ships to escape.

Am I the only person who would like more self-sufficient and isolated colonies ? The game's world is still being fleshed out. You could rationalize trade-without-visitors as trade via automated ships, or a technology that allows transporting goods very fast but is harmful to humans (maybe some flavor of teleportation?). I initially thought most of the visitors were from the same planet, but then I built a console and kept getting messages about ships passing by...

I'm strongly against startscumming and rerolling my colonists over and over, but it has its limits. I'm not going to play a colony where two characters can't haul.

At the very least, I would like to see a per-skill summary: what's the average Cooking of the trio, what's their average Mining, average Research, average Construction. And how many passion fires total that skill has.

Also, are there plans for random colony location ? That's a crash-landing ship, why do I have so much choice ? At the very least please add a "random location" button.

[Are there plans for more realistic animal behavior ?]

Are there plans for more realistic animal behavior ?

It bothers me greatly that animals in this simulation game act lobotomized. I have some ideas how to improve the situation:

* make most animals stay away from humans. In particular, they should avoid man-made constructions. I once locked a squirrel in a bedroom. It had plenty of time to flee, it just didn't care. And the walls have been constructed around it.
* hunting should be about stalking animals, not DPS. Once you shoot an animal - and miss - the animal QUICKLY runs away a fair distance. To compensate, HP of most animals would be greatly reduced. Other animals would be startled by gunfire.
* If you implement the above idea, it will be possible to add traps. As it is, they would be pointless.
* certain animals should be attracted to your farms, and eat your crops
* stronger, more confident animals like bears would try to break into your food stockpiles. If you leave food lying outside, rats and other pests will arrive.