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Some good suggestions. One I particularly like is Boston's regarding weapon length/size. Aside from reach, give an attack speed penalty to larger weapons in tight spaces like hallways. Effectively you lower the DPS of weapons like longswords indoors, and give knives and shivs a chance to shine in certain situations.

Another thought, anyone played Fire Emblem? I remember one mechanic whereby melee weapons had a rock-paper-scissors dynamic. Swords were weak against spears, which were weak against axes, which were weak against swords. Maybe something similar could diversify weapon choice a little. The problem I'm coming up with is how to justify it - it barely makes sense in Fire Emblem. Any thoughts?

And how about this. b0rsuk said

Two dudes seem tied and neither can disengage, so they just hope they don't catch too many bullets. There is little maneuvering.

and it got me thinking. What if the character's ability to maneuver/disengage while being melee'd was a function of a) his melee skill and/or b) his weapon? A seasoned fighter could slip in and out of combat more easily than an amateur. A shiv-wielding slinker could position himself more easily than someone dragging a stone club.

And this would translate to ranged combatants too - when your gunman gets caught in melee, don't you just want to get away? Maybe the guy with 8 melee skill he's otherwise not using could get away, while the 0-skill would get pummelled. Or maybe the pistol carrier can get out of reach faster than the LMG guy. Maneuverability bonus/penalty can add a whole layer of complexity to weapon choice without much cost, or taxing the AI for that matter.

Nice graph. Most interesting to me is how closely the survival rifle matches the sniper rifle. If you're not using the sniper at max range, survival is almost strictly better. From a pure DPS per cost standpoint anyway.

On the subject, I found this video very informative.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=brFG-N2bpyo

But for the sake of the argument, let's say you also start with 4 cows. Now what ?

Each cow can be milked once a day, for 8 units of food. That's 32 milk per day for 4 cows.

Each colonist requires ~20 units of food (2 meals) a day. So with 4 cows to 3 colonists, you've got about half your calories covered. Hunting, foraging, and/or growing will be required.

Double it to 8 cows (64 milk/day), and you can fully sustain 3 colonists. Then the question becomes, how many grazing cows can your biome support before you have to start growing hay, etc? Perhaps the only way to make a large herd sustainable is to live like a cowboy and travel to different pastures.

Another issue is bulls. I don't know if it's possible to start with cows without the chance of some of them being bulls.

Hey OP I'm having a hard time understanding your problem.

My issue is with the massive discrepancy between unskilled tribal ranged units and the damage they can put out relative to all other types of raids, simply because of volume of fire.

So is the problem that it's unrealistic? Does it take you out of the game?

Or is the problem that the tactic that's good against one type of raid doesn't work as well against another type of raid?

As for this statement

Because in order to prevent friendly fire damage by the very mechanics this game operates, you need to have your pawns on adjacent squares... This does not seem so difficult to understand but I have had reiterate it several times already.

what is wrong with the trade-off? Whereby a tight formation prevents friendly fire at the expense of increasing vulnerability to stray shots, and a loose formation does the opposite? It seems reasonable to me, the trade-off creates tension and rewards good tactical decisions.

Love this mod, just started using it last week. I think the scope of the changes it brings to the game is incredible. Some feedback.

- Embrasures are op af. A simple perimeter wall with recessed entrances protected by embrasures makes raids trivially easy. Enemies will lock onto attacking a door, stack up in the hallway, and can be mowed down point-blank without retaliation. Manhunters and thrumbos are even more of a joke, they will run around aimlessly, unable to acquire a target. This is less a problem with the mod and more a problem with the poor AI, which is not trained to handle embrasures. I suppose it's the same problem as killboxes in vanilla.

- Similarly, the range on most late game weapons is absurd, and AI breaking. Sniper rifles are obsolete as automatics can fire across a fully zoomed-out screen. Raids anywhere on the map can be attacked immediately from the safety of your base, and the AI is not smart enough to close that kind of distance behind cover. On a related note, it seems strange the pistol's range is so low.

- Centipedes drop WAY too much ammo, and/or the ammo sells for way too much. 10k ammo per centipede, selling at 2/unit = 20k silver per centipede. It's easy to sell to traders from anywhere on the map by making a storage zone around the piles of ammo.

- The names for the various ammo types are overwhelming, especially because the gun's description doesn't list the type of ammo it uses (and vice versa). I don't mind learning large lists of flavour text, but at least make the information available in game. Many names appear similar (5.56 NATO and 7.62 NATO for example) and several times I have crafted the wrong ammo.

- Ammo doesn't deteriorate outside. Post-raid litter is excessive.

- Shotguns are fantastic, especially birdshot. They function exactly how you'd expect shotguns to function in a game, and I found them well balanced and useful. Probably my favourite feature of the mod, great work on those.

I use them all the time, but mostly because I find it fun. I can't say whether they're more effective than snipers, or building more traps.

If you're up on resources (and I usually am) they aren't too much of an investment, even if you only get 1-2 volleys off on most raids. If resources are tight I won't bother with them. I think the niche they occupy right now is fine. I would echo one suggestion though, that the various types (incendiary, EMP) be attached to different ammo types rather than different mortar types.

* a raid + manhunter pack

This is the most intriguing to me of OP's suggestions, and I think it could really spice up late-game tribal raids while giving them more of an identity beyond "big low-tech mob."

Consider this possibility:
"Manhunter Raid! A group of tribespeople from the Orange Duck Taxabobico have arrived. They have brought with them a trained pack of maddened boomrats. They are attacking immediately."

The animals would not attack the raiders, but otherwise they'd act like a manhunter pack. A colony that usually shuts its doors and waits out a manhunter pack will have to contend with the tribals breaking down the doors.

Flavour wise, tribals are already somewhat associated with animals. The Lost Tribe scenario starts with three pets instead of one, and the tribals themselves have animal names. Colonies often keep packs of battle animals, so it makes sense that tribals would do the same. And it would give them something distinct and special to do that pirates don't do. Like a tribal version of the siege/sappers.

There have been no save errors as far as I can tell, and I am running no mods.

With a little further testing my problem seems to be the same as the linked thread. No explosions are working, from any weapon or mortar. Fire works from other sources, and other weapons work.

During the raid there was a massive explosion of 80+ stored mortar shells. That was the last explosion I can remember working.

Try this:

Set a bill to euthanize the pregnant beaver. While your doctor is operating, suspend the bill. The beaver will be anesthetized, and you can order your doc to feed it with meals. When it wakes up, repeat. It will take some micro, but you should be able to keep it sated long enough to give birth.

When I try to use either firestarting weapon, it creates an explosion but no flames.

Strangely, this phenomenon happens only on one of three maps in the file. The weapons work normally on the others.

As far as I can tell the bug began during/after a large tribal raid. I have no idea how to recreate it, as I've had plenty of raids before with no issue.

Another weird thing is the log is throwing thousands of "System.NullReferenceException," and the log file is 35k lines of text.

Save file:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B9qQZnsIxI_kOWpSdjgzd1UxdHc

Output log:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B9qQZnsIxI_kUDVYbEdDZnRvdjg

EDIT: Grenades do not function either. An explosion sound plays but no damage is dealt. Will continue testing other weapons.

@skullywag I don't want to take away the rain, just the visuals. Flowers gotta grow, and my cloth harvest gotta be disintegrated into nothingness.

Running vanilla. The lag comes and goes, and it's possible I'm misattributing the source.

The lag seems to spike during rain and snow, especially when it's on multiple maps at once. Does anyone know if there is a way to turn off the weather visuals? A mod perhaps?

When a starving colonist is eating a meal, and the progress bar is 95% done, and he goes into a daze. Reason: Starving.

Best game

How to stop a binge 102:

Set his bedtime to the current hour, he will finish what he's snorting and go right to sleep. (Note, does not work quite as well in real life)

Another trick. When a dazed colonist collapses from exhaustion, give him an operation bill. Administer beer/smokeleaf works. A doctor will feed him lying there on the ground, and then you can cancel the operation.