Arctic Colonies, Temperature, and Parkas

[Riph]

I remember shortly after the temperature system was implemented, I got this great idea that I would make an arctic colony (a fun challenge in and of itself) with the sadistic side benefit of watching those detestable mortar siege teams freeze to death.

I barely got the colony started when I realized:  Everyone spawning on this map seems to spawn with a parka.  All the raiders are smartly dressed and have nothing to fear from the cold.  Worse, I can just put parkas on all my own colonists and now all temperature problems are solved, I don't even seem to need room heaters.

Has anyone else experienced this?  I'm kind of disappointed, but off the top of my head I'm not sure how you'd implement cold weather gear that allows you to temporarily go outside and not die.

[Mathenaut]

Wait until winter. When temperatures drop into the -30s and -40s, cloth parkas aren't really going to cut it for working outdoors. This is also going to pose major power drain issues for your food production.

Pirate sieges will eventually die out in winter, though with mortars being more accurate, they stand to do alot of damage you can't afford to play cleanup with.

[tommytom]

Another issue is getting a proper world seed that has the actually challenging temperatures. It may actually be more challenging to have a more dynamic temperature than a constantly-cold temperate one (you want -50F and 40F rather than -10F and 20F, for instance).

Once you get parkas, it's actually still really easy to grow food outdoors with a few power things, solar lamps, and 1-2 heaters per grow area.

I have about 10-12 colonists and 1 outdoor-indoor grow zone of corn keeps everyone fed. I was running 2-3, but you simply fill your freezer. I made mine gigantic, then realized I could just run about one field of corn and 2 of devilstrand.

My next colony will probably be a re-re-re-re-roll of the world seed to get a really cold area.

The only problem I actually run into on my current one is even though the average temperature is about -10F almost all year round, I can lose my crops (mostly worried about devilstand) to a single solar flare. I have to actually burn fire pits during the power outage as the temp drops below the survival temps even with heaters at 80f for a buffer (hot with parkas on) even though it's only about 5 seconds before the power comes back on and those 5 seconds killed an entire field if 98% grown devilstrand... learned my lesson.

[Mathenaut]

Yeah, I just run less incident trolling because I can't stand that stuff.

[Riph]

Pirate sieges will eventually die out in winter, though with mortars being more accurate, they stand to do alot of damage you can't afford to play cleanup with.

And that's why every colony of mine is deep under a mountain.

[RemingtonRyder]

Something I noticed just now and thought I would ask - at night, do you guys sometimes see random large dips in room temperature in places that have plenty of heating?

[Keychan]

Well temperature outside normally lowers during the night, therefore it may get colder in rooms if they're not completely temperature sealed.  From my experience in freezing maps, (lowest I played was around -140 F Icesheets), building many 3x1 rooms before you reach your internal mountain base kept heat in fairly well.  Does anyone know if man-made roofs block out temperature change?

[Gennadios]

I mostly play tundra maps and I've seen my fair share of naked siegers with kevlar helmets...

Something I noticed just now and thought I would ask - at night, do you guys sometimes see random large dips in room temperature in places that have plenty of heating?

Yeah, I blame the higher night temperature and the fact that my solar panels go offline, meaning less power fed to heaters. In the dead of winter my rooms usually drop from 70-40 at night.

Also, base entrances take massive temperature dips whenever the doors open, probably the temp equalizer mechanics.

[Darkhymn]

-snip-

And that's why every colony of mine is deep under a mountain.

I found myself doing this a lot as well, so I've challenged myself to build outside a little more, and man am I glad I did. I find the extra challenge nice, and I find that my colonies are coming out more attractive, as flooring is an actual issue (can't just smooth the stone for a nice +4).

As to the topic at hand, you really do have to hunt for the truly extreme temperature ranges. It's a lot of fun once you've found one, though. I still haven't managed to adapt a successful strategy for non-mountain colonies in the frigid maps.

[lusername]

And that's why every colony of mine is deep under a mountain.

Amen. Dwarflords, represent!

I found myself doing this a lot as well, so I've challenged myself to build outside a little more, and man am I glad I did.

I've built things on the surface temporarily, but they've all been destroyed, leaving only a burned out stone hulk, as constructed roofs provide zero defense whatsoever. The mortars aren't perfectly accurate at hitting any specific structure, but once they hit it, it's gone.

I find the extra challenge nice, and I find that my colonies are coming out more attractive, as flooring is an actual issue (can't just smooth the stone for a nice +4).

Are we talking about mechanically attractive, or subjectively attractive to the user? Gameplaywise, in practice, the flooring has little to no meaningful influence, and you're going to spam statues, which are what actually boosts the value high enough for colonists to notice. The rest will be covered in stockpiles of hoarded stuff, which tends colonists tend to consider ugly anyway, but not quite ugly enough for them to whine about it.

As for how it looks, I really can't see the aesthetic appeal of not being surrounded in smooth gray stone. The surface is filled with all these garish and nasty colors, most of which are constantly on fire from the sieges. I don't find this beautiful at all, and find it actually quite unpleasant. But I've always favored a more dwarven aesthetic in real life.

As to the topic at hand, you really do have to hunt for the truly extreme temperature ranges. It's a lot of fun once you've found one, though. I still haven't managed to adapt a successful strategy for non-mountain colonies in the frigid maps.

Well, if anything, frigid maps are easier and more survivable than non-frigid maps. Heaters consume half the power of coolers, parkas laugh at all but the most extreme cold, and stuff that you kill stays frozen. It's all very convenient...just as in real life, really. You can always generate heat by setting something on fire, but there's no way to make things not hot without making something else even hotter.

[Darkhymn]

-sniptastical!-

Oh, subjectively more attractive, for sure. The most gameplay attractive flooring in the game is only available in mountain bases, and therefore hard to resist. When I build on the surface, I actually use things like wood and carpets! For reasons!

As for sieges, on standard sized maps at least, they rarely finish building a mortar before I eliminate them, so they don't do much harm. I find this more fun than just ignoring them until they starve to death like I do in mountains lol.

I must agree with you on the advantages of frigid maps, though with poor materials or crafting skills, awful quality cloth parkas don't do a whole lot of good in -40f. Deserts are definitely worse, though. Getting a ventilation system together for those coolers is a real pain in vanilla, and the central heating/cooling type mods just seem too easy. All advantages and no downsides.

[Riph]

As for sieges, on standard sized maps at least, they rarely finish building a mortar before I eliminate them, so they don't do much harm. I find this more fun than just ignoring them until they starve to death like I do in mountains lol.

This attitude I see all over and it is such a mystery to me.

When the enemy brings a mortar siege on me, they have more M-24 troopers guarding the approach to their site than I have colonists in total.  And when I do decide to get into a sniper duel, it requires ~5 quickloads before my sniper (skill 12, cyber eyes, cyber arms) manages to land a shot on their sniper (skill 3, bad back) before getting instantly headshotted.

[lusername]

Oh, subjectively more attractive, for sure. The most gameplay attractive flooring in the game is only available in mountain bases, and therefore hard to resist. When I build on the surface, I actually use things like wood and carpets! For reasons!

I wasn't aware carpets were pretty at all, from a gameplay standpoint, and in real life, they're downright disgusting. If I were going to pave over the surface according to my own aesthetic tastes, I would be using concrete, because it's the best-looking floor of the bunch, to me. For some reason colonists lack appreciation for its lovely bare grayness, though. Only place where colonist tastes and my own tastes intersect is in our appreciation for smooth, featureless stone.

As for sieges, on standard sized maps at least, they rarely finish building a mortar before I eliminate them, so they don't do much harm. I find this more fun than just ignoring them until they starve to death like I do in mountains lol.

On larger maps, it's physically impossible to get out there even if you were to march immediately upon arrival in time to stop them from bombarding your base, and out there is way, way out there.

I must agree with you on the advantages of frigid maps, though with poor materials or crafting skills, awful quality cloth parkas don't do a whole lot of good in -40f.

It's okay, the raiders will bring you more free ones, and they won't all be awful. I've never HAD to craft a parka or any other article of clothing in any game I've played. The only reason I have any tailoring facilities at all is for the amusement of giving my colonists uniforms of human skin.

Deserts are definitely worse, though. Getting a ventilation system together for those coolers is a real pain in vanilla, and the central heating/cooling type mods just seem too easy. All advantages and no downsides.

I actually don't find that to be the biggest problem, since the same techniques used to prevent cabin fever in a dwarven fortress are also the same ones used for ventilation. Deserts are extremely easy to defend in comparison, though: The roasting heat rapidly slays any raiders (and visitors) as you can't generate "cold", whereas the parka-clad marauders practically never succumb to the temperature.

This attitude I see all over and it is such a mystery to me.

When the enemy brings a mortar siege on me, they have more M-24 troopers guarding the approach to their site than I have colonists in total.

From the IRC, my impression of this is that the people who claim they can just sally forth and shoot them are either playing with mods that enable easy recovery in some way, give far better offensive power, or are playing on Easy. Because what you describe definitely matches MY experiences. To take out siege groups in my game, given that there's about 30 or 40 of them and maybe 5-10 of me, an infinite supply of them and no supply of me, generally involves either artillery duelling them from my mountain fortress, or hiding under the mountain until they pass out from exhaustion and then cutting their throats one by one.

[Darkhymn]

This attitude I see all over and it is such a mystery to me.

When the enemy brings a mortar siege on me, they have more M-24 troopers guarding the approach to their site than I have colonists in total.

From the IRC, my impression of this is that the people who claim they can just sally forth and shoot them are either playing with mods that enable easy recovery in some way, give far better offensive power, or are playing on Easy. Because what you describe definitely matches MY experiences. To take out siege groups in my game, given that there's about 30 or 40 of them and maybe 5-10 of me, an infinite supply of them and no supply of me, generally involves either artillery duelling them from my mountain fortress, or hiding under the mountain until they pass out from exhaustion and then cutting their throats one by one.

I tend to forget that I play on a median difficulty. Cassandra Challenge is a fairly gentle mistress, and that's about as tough as my skill level allows for at the moment. On 130% or 160%, or with Randy being Randy, I could see the sieges being significantly more frustrating. I've never seen a 30+ enemy raid with fewer than 15-20 colonists myself. That sounds... Not pleasant.

[lusername]

I tend to forget that I play on a median difficulty. Cassandra Challenge is a fairly gentle mistress, and that's about as tough as my skill level allows for at the moment. On 130% or 160%, or with Randy being Randy, I could see the sieges being significantly more frustrating. I've never seen a 30+ enemy raid with fewer than 15-20 colonists myself. That sounds... Not pleasant.

You think that's something? Wait until you see 5 attacks at the same time, in the middle of two ongoing sieges. The entire map becomes a straight-up war zone, everything shooting at everything else. And don't think the fact that they're fighting each other makes it better! Pawns in RimWorld are more likely to hit things OTHER than their target than their actual target, so when they shoot at each other, they'll miss and hit YOU more often than they would if they were all shooting YOU!