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I've found that no matter how few enemy groups there are, the same frequency of raids will happen, except the Storyteller will just choose between the remaining enemy groups as the source of the raid/seige.

This means that if you could somehow make all the planets factions friendly you'd still get the amount of raids, the only difference is it will always be the mechanoid faction raiding you. 

One of the things I wish I'd known back when i first started playing was that the trade beacon doesn't need power. (you can build them anywhere, and at times It's more efficient to build one next to that group of dead siege raiders in the middle of no where and sell stuff "on site" rather than drag it back to the colony first.)

Another thing I wish I'd known in the beginning is the ability to set what level of medicine a colonist (or prisoner) gets by selecting the icon in the health tab of each one. Makes it much easier to reserve the glitter world meds for the important colonists and not waste'm on the prisoners.

Thanks for all your answers.

I've continued playing in Phoebe level 3/5 difficulty and an exotic goods trader was selling the AI core for 7.000 silver

That sounds about right for cost, also if you do plan to go the "build a ship to win" approach to the game buy the A.I core the first time you see it, otherwise another may not come along for several months. (I went almost 2 years before seeing a second one after passing the first one up.)

Depending on your difficulty and planet, there's a good chance you might not survive to see the 2nd A.I core if you pass up the first one.

I've noticed I'm unable to install animal bionic eyes in most animals. (I can put them in chickens and cobras though.)

Is this bug or are most animals unable to get the bionic eyes?

Edit: I've also noticed that for chickens and cobras I have the option to harvest the organs (heart, lungs, stomach, etc,) but not for  larger animals.

Basically you just use the execute incident menu, if that's not it then I don't know

Yep, it's the last option in the execute incident dev mode menu, "Wanderer Join" or some such name.

With how rarely the event pops (about once per session right within the first month or three) it's not what I consider a really "huge cheat" and mostly I just got sick of the event generating useless people nearly as often as someone that's worth keeping.

Even then if the wanderer is highly skilled in a needed area I'm willing to tolerate it; and a frail cataracted doctor with 12+ skill can quickly earn their keep after a bad raid.

Even those incapable of violence might not be really desirable, but as long as they can clean, haul, and (hopefully) perform some other useful task  they earn their keep well enough, but it's those lazy high borns that are incapable of pretty much everything (I.e dumb labor, intellectual labor, and crafting) that get kicked to the curb without hesitation.

My main house rule is bases how the colony is run off the backgrounds and traits of my initial colonists.

if I get psychopath neurotic cannibals then that colonies going to be Reaver stronghold with prisoners on the dining menu, if it's a frontier marshal and space navy types it's going to be run like a military with clean barracks and firm but fair treatment of prisoners and such.

Letting my colonists personalities determine how things are manged and turn out I've found makes every game a little different and more fun over all.

[Entry room:]

This is a bit long, but covers the rough template I use to I build my base and what mods I for things like internal temperature regulation, etc..

I tend to build into the side of a mountain (or wall off both sides of a valley to turn it into a spacious interior) and then construct the colony around a series of 10x10 rooms as follows, with some variance on size/location depending on the over all layout of the map and how much space I have to work with.

Entry room:

This room starts off as my initial group bedroom, stockpile, & kitchen area, and later turns into the "ready room" for raid defense with shelving for weapons, embrasure firing ports, (using the enhanced defense mod) and a stone cutting table and crematorium (that way the gear off the cremated bodies dumps into an inside areas and doesn't rot away int he open before my colonists can haul it off to the stock pile.)

Main corridor:

this is a main (2 square wide) corridor running down from the main entry room that forms the "spine" of my colony, with rooms branching off on either side. Also down this corridor is various choke points with plasteel embrasures and doors (usually in the held open position by default.) that make for good fall back points in either direction should an interior breach become an issue.


Kitchen & freezer:

Moving down the main corridor to the left and right are the kitchen and freezer, a 10x10 kitchen with a professional cook stove, (courtesy of the bulk meals preparation mod.) butcher table, long dining table, 6 chairs, and usually a billiards  a chess table.

The freezer is a simple affair, an 8x8 with 2-4 coolers (depending on the climate) set to 24F and separate stockpile zones inside. (a small one near the door for cooked meals, a section to the back near the freezers second entrance for medical supplies (since herbs spoil.)


Right down below the kitchen and freezer are the stockpile and med bay

Stockpile:

A 10x10 room roughly, split up into smaller zones with areas for steel/uranium/plas steel and some for wood/stone blocks and a section for weapons & armor.


Medbay:

A 8x8 room with sterile tiles, 4 hospital beds + monitors connected to a power switch for easy turning off when no ones using it. (thanks to the power switch mod) Also in there I put the research bench since it benefits from the sterile environment. Of special note is the connecting door to the freezer for easy access to med supplies and feeding patients.

Further down is the prisoner room and central heating/cooling center.


Prison:

For the prisoner room I usually go with a 8x8 or 10x10 with 4 beds of good or better quality, a hospital bed, a small table with 4 chairs, and a chess table and probably a painting or two.

It's pretty luxurious for a prison I admit, but I mostly use it for broken colonists and only capture people I want to recruit for my colony so the happier I can make them the sooner they'll join me.


Climate Control

The central heating cooling chamber is a 6x6 room where my central AC & heater unit is (thanks for the LT redistribute heat mod) with ducts running to all my important colony rooms and smart vents for environmental control. I set the Ac about 2-4 degrees higher than the heater, and the base is generally a stable 68F all year round. This is also the room I stick the battery bank for my colony and fuses. (Thanks to RTs fusebox mod)

Down below that is the power room and hydroponics

Power room

The power room is usually where the thermal generator/s are put (thanks to the enhanced defense mod giving the ability to use a laser drill to dig thermal vents where ever you want, if you have enough uranium for it anyway.) Mostly I make the room big enough so there's 1 square of space along the perimeter of the generators for ease of repair access.


Hydroponics

I generally build this next to the thermal generator room so I can use the heat to keep it warm without wasting power on a bunch of heaters, several trays of med herbs, a few of potatoes and some of hay (thanks to the hydroponic hay mod)


Below this is the last room of the colony, the panic room.

Panic Room

This room is usually a 10x10 built with plas steel walls, with an inner ring of plas steel embrasures, 2-4 gun turrets, a few weapon lockers with charge rifles or other heavy weapons, a cooler/heater set, and a stack of 50 or so prepackaged survival meals. (or mini freezer with some fine meals on ice) a couple hospital beds and some glitter world meds and several batteries behind some walls to keep everything running for a while if need be..

The main idea is this is the room the colonists do a fighting retreat down the spinal corridor to in the event the colony is being over run and they're about done for.

It's proven a lifesaver against 50+ raider attacks that breach the outer defenses, and mechanoid invasions, and even decent protection against sappers since the plas steel walls and inner embrasures slow any entry sufficiently to defend against it. (and is usually deep enough under the mountain to be safe from mortars so colonists can heal up for a counter strike against a siege.

More recently in A 12 I've taken to adding in a small barn on the exterior of the colony (with duct work for climate control on extremely hot/cold maps) with chickens, pigs, cows, or some other meat farmable animal, and designating the panic room as a "raid defense" animal zone to secure pets into when raids happen so they don't get killed in the opening volleys of the battle.

Normally I play with Cassandra or Phoebe on "Challenge,"

I like to use EDP's "prepare carefully" mod so set up my initial four colonists (I prefer four over three since it lets me specialize them a bit more for specific tasks) and give them some starter gear better suited to the terrain they're landing in. (no more parkas when landing in the desert.)

Once they're dirt side I let things happen as they will mostly without cheating, but do plenty of micro managing since they seem incapable of properly prioritizing tasks on their own even with the work list set. (A raid is gearing up to attack, but instead of finishing up the turrets they'd rather build a shiny new kitchen and bedroom set?)

The only cheating I do is re-queue the "wanderer joins" event until I get a colonist I consider "acceptable." (No room in my colonies for crippled prostophobes with cataracts, lazy neurotic slowpokes, or dilettantes that refuse to haul or clean.) Those that are unacceptable I just hit with the dev mode destroy button before re-queuing the event.

Meh. They're still useful as suicide bombers.

Only when your colonist manages to "release" them in time, otherwise a long range sniper shot into one before the enemy is close enough to sic them, and the dozen or so boom rats surrounding your colonist will turn him (and a nice little section of your base) into a burning mess.

Anyone know if the -10 from prostophobe is cumulative or if its a flat modifier?  If I add more prosthetics, will it maker her unhappier, or will she stay at her current mood.  If its the latter, than there's probably no reason not to turn her into a full cyborg.

It's a flat penalty, no matter how much cyberware they have in them, so if you have the parts there's no reason not to make her into the bionic woman. 

Are there any other options for her?

You can always harvest the eyes and other organs of a prisoner to heal her, (or harvest the eyes from one your other colonists and give that colonist cyber eyes) or sometimes you find actual organs for sale from traders.

As far as her brain goes it's too late to do anything for it now she has a AI chip installed, since removing it would kill her.

Usually once prostophobes get dementia it's time to send them packing (I.E arrest and release) or just sell them into slavery if the -10 mood debuff is enough to put them on the edge of breaking.

Is there any way to heal frail? As I understand you can heel bad back with the spine replacement, but what about frail?

Not with this mod, but the Glitter Tech Mod (which is fully compatible with this one btw) has exo skeletons that you can install in the torso to remove torso injuries. 

I used to make a paste maker for my colonists to use until I had enough time to get a stockpile of meals cooked. Since using the bulk meal preparation mod (basically is lets your cook make 4 or with research, 8 meals at a time.) I found I was able to cook sufficient quantities for my colonists without needing a paste dispenser to hold them over.

(I still usually keep one around though for emergencies since in a pinch you can load the hopper with human meat and still feed the colony without the cannibalism debuff.)

I have to admit I like the idea of some kind of hopper for the stone cutting bench to cut down on the number of trips a colonist has to make to the dumping grounds for chunks of stone; having a stack of 10 stone chunks right at the bench would be really handy, especially on harsher maps where building the bench outside isn't possible do to environmental extremes.

[The Fall of Defiance]

The Fall of Defiance

Using the expanded cybernetics mod and taking my time I finally had a full set of advanced cybernetic and bionic implants ready for Henry my colonists main combat monkey. (A Space Marine who'd defended the colony since day one and had his fair share of injuries, from a missing eye to stab wounds, bitten off toes, and torso burns.)

Right after he's anesthetized and the Space Navy doc had just finished installing his cyberware, the Mechanoid spy event pops, and my doc turns out to be the traitor.

With my only other functional colonist incapable of violence and unable to stop her, (The army cook had gone berserk a while back and was in lock up, and the janitor was fighting off a severe torso infection one bed over.) the doc easily starts fleeing, up until I remember I have the ability to force fire my turrets...

It was a long shot that the defense turrets would down the doc without killing her but they managed! And my single ambulatory colonist was able to rescue her and drag her back to the brig. It was at that point I noticed she'd been head shot and brain damaged, along with a missing leg, and was the only colonist with medical training. (The rest were around 4-7.)

Without her medical skill the colonist in the hospital never made it through the infection, and the Space Marines clumsy attempt at giving her a peg leg prosthetic nearly killing her, and doing nothing to fix her vegetative state, leaving just him and Brandy, the passive colonist who refused to cook.

Fast forward a couple weeks and one mechanoid raid later, (Which Henry held off valiantly despite the loss of most of the bases defense turrets) and the colony finds itself with the Space Marine turned cybernetic death machines clumsy attempt at making meals was giving continual food poisoning to  everyone; along with his lack of skill at growing or harvesting food ruining most the crops he tried to harvest anyway, resulting in a slow decline into starvation seemed the future of the colony, with the next raid offering a slim hope at sustenance. (Cannibalism is better that starvation at least.)

Unfortunately with only the terminator defending the fortress against 50+ raiders he was forced to fall back repeatedly even freeing the prisoner for some slim aid, until he stood alone, defending a brain dead doctor/spy against an inevitable wave of death as the colony burned to ashes around him, the bucking wood walls causing roof collapses that fortunately felled many an aggressor along with his deadly accurate charge rifle, before succumbing to the heat himself and perishing in the flames.

The brain dead doc miraculously survived albeit suffering from extreme heat stroke, and lingered on for several days while I hoped for a wandering colonist event to occur and save the day, but unfortunately she froze to death during a cold snap, leaving a mostly burned out shell of a colony and the slowly rusting hulk of Henry the space marine turned terminator at her side, a memorial to the fall of Defiance...

I know its an old topic, just wanted to state that you pretty much can't harvest organs from a dead person in the real world. They pretty much have to die in a hospital bed and the organs have to be removed right away, essentially kept alive after the person dies. If the body dies, the organs die with it.

Not entirely accurate actually, there's been many organ donors that have died in car wrecks and such that still had viable organs once the cadaver reached a near by hospital. The window is relatively short, but the major organs will remain viable for around 30 minutes in the body before they need to be extracted and put on ice to await the donor recipient.