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I have no idea if it's the actual implementation, but RimWorld's graphics mostly look sprite-based, not texture-based to me.

Technically speaking they are textures, merely wrapped to a 2D object, as digging through the files will attest. Sprites are a particular way of achieving 2D (or isometric) graphics, not 2D graphics as a whole. Regardless, it has a couple of major advantages over more "realistic" 3D modeling:
- one, it's very lightweight, which is good since simulation games tend not to play well with system resources;
- two, it's easy for a small team to make or commission without a lot of overhead (and by the same token, it's equally easy for modders to, well, mod);
- and three, abstraction leads to more abstraction. By that I mean - because the art style is simple and stylized, it makes sense that we don't see people's hands actually holding weapons or grabbing items, or working at benches, etc. Because there are no legs, it makes sense that people can change direction instantly or are knocked back squarely instead of having to stagger or sprawl back. It immensely simplifies not just the pawns standing there, but especially all the interactions that would otherwise look "weird" if they were abstracted.

As far as a raster-vs.-vector approach, I suspect part of it has to do with implementation (I've never, despite having said I would several times, sat down and learned Unity, but I suspect "make a plane primitive and stick this texture on it" is pretty straightforward) and part of it to do with mod compatibility (I feel like relatively few casual modders are used to working in vector graphics or have the tools for it, while raster graphics are more standard).

Ultimately, while I don't think the basic art style of the game is going to change, specific areas you think could use touch-ups might be welcome feedback.

Assigning beds to medical use, ordering your pawns to rest in them instead of working, and making sure they're promptly treated by skilled doctors with decent medicine will all make the illness pass more quickly.

Any kind of AI would be found in C# code, not in the defs, unfortunately.

You can cook meals at a campfire, definitely. (They are, to the eternal confusion of, well, everyone, listed under Temperature in the builder.) Slower butchery at a crafting spot is a fairly common suggestion; I don't know if anyone's made mods to implement it.

Re: milk, the reason they don't haul is because milking one animal and hauling the milk, then milking another animal and hauling the milk, and so on, is a tremendously inefficient way to haul things. Until RW is clever enough to have pawns lay out an itinerary along the lines of "milk all of these animals, then haul all of the products" (which is really a lot more difficult than it sounds, especially since the animals usually roll over to milkable at slightly different times, and the products - and therefore the associated hauling jobs - don't exist yet when the pawn sets out) this is unfortunately the most efficient way to handle it.

However, you shouldn't have your livestock roaming all over the map if you can avoid it. It's generally best to keep them fairly close to home using an allowed zone, both so your handlers and haulers don't have to move so far to process their milk/eggs/wool, and so you can protect them more easily.

The issue is that the siege worker, as it currently stands, doesn't take the faction's tech level into account at all. Thus there are three options available to you:

- Turn off sieges for the medieval faction(s) by going into their faction defs and removing the <canSiege> line.

- If you don't want anyone using high-tech mortars, you could directly overwrite the mortar to change its graphics, text, and so forth to, say, a trebuchet or a black powder mortar (these weapons date to about the 15th century). Sieges will show up and use these the way they would normally use mortars.

- Alternatively, if you wanted a mix of high- and low-tech factions that could siege you with appropriate equipment, you'd have to first add lower-tech artillery, then modify the function SiegeBlueprintPlacer.PlaceArtilleryBlueprints to take into consideration the tech level of the faction.

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3.
Damage that armor takes should be reduced by what the resulting damage dealt to the pawn would be. Currently shoddy armor with lower reduction values last longer than legendary armor because armor just takes what it isn't dealt to the pawn. 10 damage at 10% reduction means shoddy armor only takes 1 damage, but a Legendary armor that reduces at 100% takes 10 damage and degrades faster.

I'm 99% sure this was meant to be addressed in A17 - was it not?

If you managed to scavenge any sniper rifles, sieges are very bad about responding to people trying to pick them off from afar. You'll have to deal with any siegers with sniper rifles, but then they're pretty much sitting ducks. I recommend starting this immediately, so you can pick off their builders while they're trying to set up.

You have to be careful, though, because once they take some losses they'll try to rush your base.

In most of the ancient world the custom was that the host was responsible for the safety of his guests. If his guests were harmed in any way their relatives and friends would hold the host personally responsible. So man up and take better care of your guests! 

In most of the ancient world, if you told your guests "come inside, there's a pack of monkeys on the way, oh, and don't stand in front of the turrets", they'd do it.

It's best to have them in power-of-2 sizes, so 64, 128, 256, 512, or 1024 on a side. Generally I've had good results designing things at 64 px for each in-game tile, and then scaling them to the nearest size when I'm done.

Clothes are an exception: I always use the base colonist bodies as a guide so that I can be sure they're the right size and shape.

I would also like to see a separate visual effect for when an attack hits armor. Just so it is easier to tell mid combat which targets are armored. I mean its easy enough for power armor, but Armor Vests are more frequently encountered and can get hidden under Jackets and such. Which makes it difficult to identify the armored targets in a fight, without pausing and manually examining every enemy...

A visual effect could get kind of busy (what would it even look like? sparks?) but some kind of notification would be nice. There was a mod in A16 I think that added a bunch of new text motes during combat, so you'd see feedback on things like hits, misses, damage... it would be nice to have feedback like "armor blocked" or "dodged" so you'd know whether your tactics were working or not.

I've heard of people doing this before, so it must be there...

Dumb question: you're 100% sure the area is fully enclosed, right? If you put a normal heater there, it heats up fine?

The high-tech research bench is listed by defName in the research projects that require it (same with the multi-analyzer). Your modified version should work exactly the same as long as it still has the defName "HiTechResearchBench". Otherwise, you'll need to update all the tier 3 and 4 research to point at the new defName.

Mods can totally add tech requirements for core items, either by the old overwriting method or by the new patching one.

As for the tech level idea, I personally wouldn't like that. I'd rather you choose which techs to research based on your preferences and the needs of your colony, not just because you have to catch 'em all.

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Need to look into making the Manual drill being okay outside in the rain. Only want it to have negative impact for being manually operated instead of the Electric drill. And I also want to make the Electric drill be susceptible to rain outdoors, forcing players to use it inside where it will be the most productive.

If you mean having a work penalty for being outdoors - that's controlled by the building property <workSpeedPenaltyOutdoors> which takes a value of true or false. Likewise the property <workSpeedPenaltyTemperature>.

If on the other hand you mean that you want the electrical drill to have a chance of short-circuiting in the rain, I believe that's what the <startsElectricalFires> flag on its CompProperties_Power is for.

I added the <HeatPerTickWhileWorking> to the Building. I also added <HeatPusher> to the Comps. I think I messed up somewhere.

You shouldn't need to do both. HeatPerTick will generate heat only while the drill is being used, while HeatPusher will generate heat all the time.

As far as the unfinishedThingDef: that's how they're meant to work. I've never actually tried using one for a recipe that wasn't created by an item, so I can't guarantee that it will do exactly what you want, though.

When posting code on the forums, you can use the Code tag (the button with the # on it) to create a scrolling area so it doesn't take up as much of the page.

In order to be considered "cheap", the material needs to cost less than $5 per unit. However, small-volume materials are accounted for, meaning things like silver cost 10x their normal market value for the purpose of the cheapness function.

There's another parameter that will prevent it from using anything with 50% or more flammability, which I assume is true for ruins because you don't see ruins with wooden walls by default.

The third requirement is that it is in the list of stuffs that can be used to build walls.

Once it's picked out a wall material, it uses the first floor it can find that uses that material, or concrete as a fallback.