Messages

How about run it as mood modifiers.

Something like:
Saw a fire recently +1
Saw a big fire recently +4
Saw a huge fire recently +7
Haven't seen fire in a while -2
Haven't seen fire in a long time -5
Haven't seen fire what seems like forever -20

Then make the "burning things" break a normal break (maybe one that only affects pyros) but otherwise dependent on their mood.  With some micro it can be managed, could even be seen as a minor positive.

I'm sure some of it is just "it's still in Alpha" but I really think there should be a map when you get there, and a mini-quest so to speak to get the ship.

Generate a map, generate the ship, generate some sort of enemy faction (a raider/scrapper base?  A giant insect hive?  A robot stronghold?) may the colonists have one more test to get to the launchpad.

Seconded.

Maybe add a preference list for herbivores/carnivores where they'll spend a little effort looking for preferred things before eating whatever's nearby?

1) Henry falls to the planet bleeding profusely from multiple cuts. He has 9 hours to live. He gets up, walks into my camp, takes up a medical bed. No warden or doctor may treat him, so.. He dies alone in bed.

Does this actually ever happen (in vanilla)? I can't remember ever having a spacer drop who could walk - they were alway incapacitated.
Other than that I'm just wondering about this event, how do our colonists land safely with no injury at while all these other people seem to crash land...

I had a drop pod that crashed with a couple of bruises and only a single cut (bleeding was in the 30% range), he was downed when he landed but healed enough to stand up just before my colonist got there to rescue him.  Walked off the map on his own.

I'll grant I'm playing a game that's pretty far from vanilla but I can't think of anything that would change healing rates or injuries or this event.

I don't know if I'd want it to be required but it would be neat if they had some demands that would give vast boosts to the recruitment chance.

Turn that 0.5% into a 10%-15%.

Would go well with a system to enforce keeping the promises.  The Brawler that wants a sniper rifle and a *good* cowboy hat should become unhappy when he gets assigned a limestone club and the Kevlar helmet uniform policy.

The main improvement I would like to see is the idea that raids shouldn't start occurring without some sort of sensible warning/reason. For instance, a pirate faction wants to use you by collecting ransom money or food or medicine every season. The demand could even steadily or exponentially increase over time. Once you reject their demands, maybe then they start raiding your place. It makes more sense from a storytelling standpoint.

I've always thought that before (most) raids a trade-like screen should pop up with a list of options for demands.

"A Pirate from the Craigs-on-the-Cliffs is here with a band of 4 ruffians ready to attack!"
--> Trade Screen
Don't attack today! [value 500 silver]
Don't attack this week! [value 1500 silver]
Don't attack this season! [value 2500 silver]

Could even use the existing mechanics to limit what the pirates want to trade for (weapons, prisoners, medicine, drugs) and vary the demands/prices.

Sure maybe sometimes they'd break their word (I mean, pirates!), or maybe sometimes they'll decide not to attack despite not being paid but it would be good variety to the raids.

And if they're pissed enough at you they probably wouldn't want to negotiate, but that should be more the exception than the rule (at least at the beginning of the game).

I just found out that you can put sleeping spots on the interaction spots of workbenches to get a free 40% comfort. I get that stools, dining chairs, and armchairs would give the colonist something to sit to improve comfort. But a sleeping spot that you create out of thin air shouldn't do anything, right?

Is this actually an exploit? Now that I think about it, sleeping spots are very weird... They give 40% comfort (vs 0% from sleeping on the ground without sleeping spot), but don't require anything to be build. How does that work?

For the attachments, notice the difference in location of the little white triangle under the comfort bar.

The former sounds like it's clearly a bug.

The latter is probably a case of at least it's a planned place to sleep that's "yours" as opposed to just passing out from exhaustion somewhere.  It would probably make more sense if a sleep spot took a small amount of labor to create even if it doesn't take materials and the comfort it provides should be based off of the type of ground.

Thank you.  It isn't obvious.

Is it always for inputs across all benches and bills?

Yes, which makes it meaningless for a lot of them.

Output is a mix of random factor and the skill of the person making it (and other factors that impact the pawn's skill, bionic limbs and whatever).

In the smelter (and other tables) is a slider for quality and hit points.

is that to determine inputs or outputs?

It's for inputs, useful for the "smelt weapons" if you want to just have a blanket "shoddy-poor" weapons get smelted.  Or "0-50% HP" weapons.

I really like this idea and I see it as kind of a step towards the a sort of "alliance" victory condition.

Once you get a relationship of X (50?) with a faction, highlight a part of the map boarder, connect your train station to this spot and then spend an a lot of steel (proportional to distance to that faction on the world map?) to build a route to them.

After that you'd start getting train traders from the faction on a regular basis - at least as long as you maintain your relationship with them and keep the track undamaged.

Connect the same station to a second faction and you'll start getting traders that pay you to pass through your "hub."  If you want to get fancy add some sort of negotiation to the process to broker agreements if the other factions aren't friendly with each other.

This has the added benefit of incentivizing players to protect the train tracks across the map, which raiders would love to target.  Raiders would probably even try "train heists" with small groups that don't plan to approach your base at all, just hit the train (and your relationship with the owning faction) and escape with some quick loot.

Tie this to a victory condition of "unite all the non-pirate factions together for X days and negotiate a grand trading alliance" to establish yourself as a fixture on the world.

Is the good old "easy entrance" considered an exploit? I mean, creating one "free path" to your base full of traps and directly in front of your guns.

I have watched in some videos that sometimes they sap, but if they dont they will all die easily.

It's an exploit in the sense that raiders should learn "hey this entrance is where all the turrets are, let's try the back door" after a few times.

I would think a possible fix to this would be to add a "cost" layer to the map for other factions that increases when a faction member dies (is injured?) at a location to shift the pathing.  Eventually "through the wall" will be cheaper than "through the big open entrance where everyone always dies."

Creepy voice should have an audible sound whenever the pawn is on the screen.  For immersion.

strength is required to pierce body armor, if there is no armor, all stabs will be equal in terms of damage.

Well, sorta.  Strength still plays a factor.  Being able to cut through bone takes a fair amount of strength with bladed weapons, crushing weapons are even more sensitive to the strength of the wielder.

I'm not convinced that "strength" should ultimately mean "melee skill" though, a miner or a blacksmith might have as much raw strength when swinging a club as a melee specialist does.

To me melee skill should affect your chance of hitting and being hit far more than the damage though.  A skilled fencer will have a far better grasp of melee concepts than the miner that picks up a club to defend himself, though the latter might have more strength in his arm.

Well, less "operation" and more "bill"

Really it should be similar to the advanced animal training, chance for success and a required number of successes for the "training."  Combine with sufficiently long time for the activity and maybe a mood penalty after each session for balance.

Maybe less-aggressive hauler-type bugs?  If you leave them alone long enough they'll start scavenging from your base.

If you ignore them you can have a semi-peaceful existence at the cost of them looting your freezer from time to time (amount based on number of hives).

If you attack them they'll start organizing "raids" with soldiers (sized based on number of hives).