Endgame Raider Camps

[lt_halle]

Alright, I've noticed lately a lot of complaints on here are that this game basically turns into a tower defense simulator once you get a strong base set up. Most suggestions I've seen to counteract this don't seem like they'd be too fun - I don't want 10 raiders with grenades to nuke my outer walls. If raiders just destroy all walls after the first few waves, then why build walls at all? Likewise, punishing the player for cooping up somehow (like earthquakes, plagues, etc.) would be viable as a general nuisance but if they were majorly game-impacting it would completely remove the turtling playstyle from the game later on.

So my idea is that, using Cassandra time as a baseline, raiders will eventually establish "camps" after day 60-70 (the point at which most any player whose survived has a mostly impregnable defense system). These camps are marked by the landing of a special class with the raiders. Something like Pirate Captain or Renegade Commander, etc. Basically some sort of leadership position title. This NPC would have insane bonuses and, if captured, would be worth a fortune but be unrecruitable. Think +10-12 shooting and melee levels of rediculous, to the point where he'll kill most anyone in a straight up fight. I'd think he'd also be armed with the best gear available to the raid (perhaps even give this type a unique weapon that gets special bonuses? Like a legendary item in DF). From here on this raider will be referred to as the Leader.

the Leader and a group of 6-7 armed guards show up. Over the course of about a day, the raiders establish a camp - complete with power, sandbags, food, and maybe a turret or two. Once they complete the camp, the player gets the message "Raiders have established a forward base near your colony!"

This is where if gets hard, and solves the turtling problem. Every 1-2 days, the raiders send out an attack wave. This consists of about 40-50% of the raiders you'd get in a normal wave (landing and immediately rushing to the base). These raiders then function as a normal wave, fleeing independently of the Leader and his posse. However, they would be sent at a rate that only the most well-defended colonies could defend indefinitely, and even then eventually a wave would overlap with an independent second raid and probably end your colony.

This is quite long-winded I know, but I'm getting there, I promise. The way this would solve the turtling issue is that the only way to stop the raider waves would be to destroy the base. This would require a force of well-armed colonists to seek and destroy. Once the leader dies, the rest flee, leaving you to claim whatever was at the base (I'm thinking usually a decent stockpile of metal, food, and weapons) as well as converting anything left in the base to be your own constructions, allowing you to inhabit them or sell them off. The camp setup AI would be smart - to prevent corralling, it wouldn't set up near any mines, turrets, or colony-made structures. The pirates would quickly dispatch a decent-sized area of structures if there was no space available to set up. Thus, these sort of raids would always be a threat no matter what defenses you have prepared.

There you have it, that's my idea. A bit rough because I pounded it out just now, but I'm sure with feedback it could really shine. The best part is it really wouldn't require much AI coding to complete - the raider waves function exactly as normal ones and the camp could just use pre-existing colonist AI and coding modified to be for the enemy. The only tough part would be designing the camp-building stuff, but obviously this suggestion wouldn't be implemented any time soon. Just a last word, too - this probably wouldn't work until there are things like body armor in the game, as otherwise colonists die too easy when exposed and no matter what you'd be taking unacceptable losses.

On a final note, having enemy bases to kill would finally give a use to molotovs and frags for you own troops!

TL;DR Pirates land with a leader and set up a camp that they stage constant raider waves from. The only way to stop the waves is to send out a group of your own soldiers to kill the leader or a sufficient amount of the base's inhabitants to induce fleeing. Then you get a tidy sum of resources for your work! Good job!

[ShadowDragon8685]

I like this idea, but it should work like a siege in DF. If the player holds out long enough, they'll just abandon what they can't take with them and bugger off, because all they're accomplishing is losing men. Obviously they'd take the food and metal, but would just leave the structures behind.

[e]Also, the raiders should also have to deal with morale and sleep, etcetera. If the player chooses to hit and run rather than fight them stand-up, eventually the pirates will get angry and demand to leave. Especially if the player keeps burning down their living quarters and they have to sleep in the open and stuff.

[lt_halle]

I like this idea, but it should work like a siege in DF. If the player holds out long enough, they'll just abandon what they can't take with them and bugger off, because all they're accomplishing is losing men. Obviously they'd take the food and metal, but would just leave the structures behind.

[e]Also, the raiders should also have to deal with morale and sleep, etcetera. If the player chooses to hit and run rather than fight them stand-up, eventually the pirates will get angry and demand to leave. Especially if the player keeps burning down their living quarters and they have to sleep in the open and stuff.

You make some good points. However, it seems odd that the leader would just set up a camp and leave again right away. What if, at the end, if they haven't accomplished anything after a long time, they spawn a full raider wave and send the Leader + any remaining guards with the attack. Perhaps have something special about it too, like they'll break down the closest walls to circumvent your main defenses? That way there's a satisfying conclusion to the raid and you still get screwed over if you don't kill it and don't have a huge amount of defenses set up at every possible entrance to your colony.

[maxthebeast11]

There's a quote from another post in which Tynan states that he certainly plans on turning the game into one about offense. I can only assume that he meant, in his post, something along the lines of what you have explained. However, I very much like the idea of some sort of leader for the raiders, as well as Shadow's contribution in that they should deal with the same burdens that your colonists suffer.

[ShadowDragon8685]

You make some good points. However, it seems odd that the leader would just set up a camp and leave again right away. What if, at the end, if they haven't accomplished anything after a long time, they spawn a full raider wave and send the Leader + any remaining guards with the attack. Perhaps have something special about it too, like they'll break down the closest walls to circumvent your main defenses? That way there's a satisfying conclusion to the raid and you still get screwed over if you don't kill it and don't have a huge amount of defenses set up at every possible entrance to your colony.

"Everyone we've sent against these psychotic militia compound nutjobs is now in a mass grave. Clearly, the only solution is to LEROY JENKINS!"

Sure, if you're a religious zealot. Not if you're a profit-motivated pirate captain. Ordering demoralized men at the end of a long and failed siege into a headlong charge against the enemy's walls is a good way to get shot in the back.

[lt_halle]

You make some good points. However, it seems odd that the leader would just set up a camp and leave again right away. What if, at the end, if they haven't accomplished anything after a long time, they spawn a full raider wave and send the Leader + any remaining guards with the attack. Perhaps have something special about it too, like they'll break down the closest walls to circumvent your main defenses? That way there's a satisfying conclusion to the raid and you still get screwed over if you don't kill it and don't have a huge amount of defenses set up at every possible entrance to your colony.

"Everyone we've sent against these psychotic militia compound nutjobs is now in a mass grave. Clearly, the only solution is to LEROY JENKINS!"

Sure, if you're a religious zealot. Not if you're a profit-motivated pirate captain. Ordering demoralized men at the end of a long and failed siege into a headlong charge against the enemy's walls is a good way to get shot in the back.

Right now I'm going for balance rather than practicality or sense. If we just have them up and leave after a bunch of failures, we're back to square one - you can easily just turtle your way through the pirate waves if you only have to worry about a handful before the raiders pack up camp and leave.

Like I said, the attack could be special. It's one thing to charge headlong after a half dozen waves before you failed. It's a different story to get fed up with your incompetent crew, personally waltz over to the nearest blocked off entrance to the colony and demolish it, before calling down the rest of your crew to assail the now-open colony which probably has few-to-no defenses in your new route of attack. And remember from a morale standpoint that he wouldn't just be ordering the charge, he'd be leading it.

[maxthebeast11]

"Right now I'm going for balance rather than practicality or sense."

Stop right there.

[ShadowDragon8685]

Right now I'm going for balance rather than practicality or sense. If we just have them up and leave after a bunch of failures, we're back to square one - you can easily just turtle your way through the pirate waves if you only have to worry about a handful before the raiders pack up camp and leave.

Square one is a perfectly fine place to be. "Hole up inside basically impregnable fortifications and wait for the other guy to sod the hell off" is a time-honored response to being besieged.

Some types of enemies might well throw themselves straight at that. Witless animals, for instance. Religious zealots. People who are hell-bent on your destruction and don't care if you take them down with you.

Profit-motivated pirates are not that list.

Like I said, the attack could be special. It's one thing to charge headlong after a half dozen waves before you failed. It's a different story to get fed up with your incompetent crew, personally waltz over to the nearest blocked off entrance to the colony and demolish it, before calling down the rest of your crew to assail the now-open colony which probably has few-to-no defenses in your new route of attack. And remember from a morale standpoint that he wouldn't just be ordering the charge, he'd be leading it.

Which doesn't change anything, it just means the player has to spend more time making more defenses. Especially since, as you know from which way the pirate captain will be coming, you can simply reconfigure your farm or whatever into another gun battery. And that's assuming there even is more than one wall leading to the colony, there may well not be.

[lt_halle]

Fine, ramp it up then. If you don't come out and stop them, instead of attacking you directly they bring in ordinance - perhaps some kind of orbital bombardment on your defense systems. The AI would find whichever areas have large concentrations of defensive entrapments - turrets, sandbags, etc - and the pirate ship would blow it up from space. To stop you from building dummy defenses saturated to make the ship blow it to hell, it would also check for areas where the waves mostly died previously. Or have pirates mine their way into your base through a random route. Or anything, really. There's endless ways a captain of a large raider fleet could break down the puny defenses of a colony if his initial raiders lack success.

[ShadowDragon8685]

Fine, ramp it up then. If you don't come out and stop them, instead of attacking you directly they bring in ordinance - perhaps some kind of orbital bombardment on your defense systems. The AI would find whichever areas have large concentrations of defensive entrapments - turrets, sandbags, etc - and the pirate ship would blow it up from space. To stop you from building dummy defenses saturated to make the ship blow it to hell, it would also check for areas where the waves mostly died previously. Or have pirates mine their way into your base through a random route. Or anything, really. There's endless ways a captain of a large raider fleet could break down the puny defenses of a colony if his initial raiders lack success.

So why would he pussyfoot around sending waves of half-a-dozen guys at a time? Why wouldn't he just start off with the orbital bombardment? And following that, drop his whole crew of 70+ straight on your settlement at once, curbstomping you with his superior firepower and numbers.

[lt_halle]

Fine, ramp it up then. If you don't come out and stop them, instead of attacking you directly they bring in ordinance - perhaps some kind of orbital bombardment on your defense systems. The AI would find whichever areas have large concentrations of defensive entrapments - turrets, sandbags, etc - and the pirate ship would blow it up from space. To stop you from building dummy defenses saturated to make the ship blow it to hell, it would also check for areas where the waves mostly died previously. Or have pirates mine their way into your base through a random route. Or anything, really. There's endless ways a captain of a large raider fleet could break down the puny defenses of a colony if his initial raiders lack success.

So why would he pussyfoot around sending waves of half-a-dozen guys at a time? Why wouldn't he just start off with the orbital bombardment? And following that, drop his whole crew of 70+ straight on your settlement at once, curbstomping you with his superior firepower and numbers.

There is a point in game design where you have to forego some amount of realism to account for engaging and fun gameplay. There's nothing fun or engaging about having just shy of 100 raiders storm into your base and instantly destroy you (not to mention the game would crash unless you were playing from NASA). There's nothing fun or engaging about having an orbital bombardment nuke your defenses and probably a few colonists with no way to stop it. There is something fun and engaging about having to dispatch a squad of soldiers to raze a pirate camp, or facing near certain death if you don't.

Yes, when they attack your base in force it's supposed to be overpowered. You're pretty much supposed to die from it unless you pull off some godly defense work, and if you do you deserve to live. But that's because you're presented with a clear objective and ample time to complete it: kill the Leader. If you don't kill him and get screwed over because of it, that's your fault, just like it'd be your fault if your colonists starved to death at the start of the game because you didn't build a paste dispenser.

There are a lot of games - yes, even the ones intended to be realistic - in which some realism has been detracted to exponentially increase gameplay value. The only game I can think of that is pretty much 100% realistic is the Arma series, and having played it, the only time I actually had fun with it was when I had to play it whilst fighting off hordes of decidedly not-realistic zombies.

By the way, the reason it would be pointless to have them leave and take us back to square one is because literally the entire point of this suggestion was to provide at least a small circumvention to the turtle play style that would force the player to do something about it outside of sitting in base and letting turrets mow down the enemy. If you could defeat the event made to stop you from sitting in base and defending by sitting in base and defending, there's really no point to it at all, is there?

[ShadowDragon8685]

If you could defeat the event made to stop you from sitting in base and defending by sitting in base and defending, there's really no point to it at all, is there?

And now you're finally getting my point!

"Go out and kill the pirate leader" is one way to stop a pirate siege.

"Win at defending in sieges because you're that great a defender in that tight a defensible position" is another. And is my preferable choice. So smacking me down with rods from god before storming in with a ridiculous wave of bad guys is asinine, and it begs the question: why didn't he do that a week and a half ago when he first arrived? Why did he bother setting up a basecamp and showing up in person to be shot?

[lt_halle]

If you could defeat the event made to stop you from sitting in base and defending by sitting in base and defending, there's really no point to it at all, is there?

And now you're finally getting my point!

"Go out and kill the pirate leader" is one way to stop a pirate siege.

"Win at defending in sieges because you're that great a defender in that tight a defensible position" is another. And is my preferable choice. So smacking me down with rods from god before storming in with a ridiculous wave of bad guys is asinine, and it begs the question: why didn't he do that a week and a half ago when he first arrived? Why did he bother setting up a basecamp and showing up in person to be shot?

Being able to do something like set up an amazing defensive position would be a valid tactic if I weren't so easy to break the defensive system to be nigh-impossible to get past. Once you have a path of blasting charges and ten turrets watching a one-square hole in the wall, there's really not much that can get through to you. There's no strategic setup or anything, just put as many turrets on the hole as possible and you'll massacre any raiders who don't get slaughtered by a fifty-square mine highway. It takes resources, yes, but once you figure out how to get it all set up you can do it in any given scenario without much forethought, and there's next to no risk in doing it. You don't say "Oh, hm, I wonder if it would be better to build a bunker for my colonists or if I should just make a line of turrets and charges?", you just do the latter every time because it always works with no danger.

Basically, I'm trying to turn stacking as many turrets as possible on a choke point from a no risk, high reward to a low risk, medium reward scenario. As least this way you'll need to make sure you have at least a few colonists who can shoot worth a damn if you want to survive.

Since there's talk of negotiating in the future, maybe you could alternatively pay the pirates to leave you alone or something if you lack the manpower to take them out, but there has to be something other than more tower defense but with a slightly modified format for a while.

[todofwar]

Adding in a vote for this. Especially if you have to deal with defectors and saboteurs when morale runs low. Perhaps instead of having to kill their leader you just have to launch a few surprise attacks of your own, eliminate their food supply or set fire to their camp a few times and they get the hint. Either way, adding in some offense in end game would be great.

Shadow, no offense but you seem to shoot everything down that doesn't play into your hyper-turtle strategy, when the developer himself said he's not in favor of that and that's not what Rimworld is designed for. It currently works, but one of the main goals seems to be making it not work so well. 

[Galileus]

Yes, when they attack your base in force it's supposed to be overpowered. You're pretty much supposed to die from it unless you pull off some godly defense work, and if you do you deserve to live. But that's because you're presented with a clear objective and ample time to complete it: kill the Leader. If you don't kill him and get screwed over because of it, that's your fault, just like it'd be your fault if your colonists starved to death at the start of the game because you didn't build a paste dispenser.

Ah, the good old times, when we were allowed to have fail states It's not good design nowadays if your player can possibly loose...