Why live outside mountains anymore?

[Japzzi]

I have always made my town outside of mountains but now I am starting to think it is just a death sentence. I returned to the game after a long time off to see that there has been made loads of good stuff! The siege thing is fine because the challenge is fun but now with Toxic fallout, maneaters and other nasty stuff it is pretty hard to defend yourself.

Making a base inside a mountain can be very hard to set up (Atleast for me.) but the fact that you get some much defensive is pretty nice. And you dont get affected by the toxic cloud and maneaters as much. And mortars cant do much either can they?

[RickyMartini]

The only upside of mining into a mountain is that

1. You get to use the space inside the mountain and can use the space outside for other stuff.
2. Mortars make literally zero damage.

Only downside is that it takes way longer to set up your base and you also have to store the mined stones somewhere.

[zandadoum]

you also need to make sure that the base you dug into the mountain has actually thick roof.
or you can get unlucky and have a 20man mechanoid raid drop right into your bedrooms.

also: don't build stuff that's flammable in a mountain base. if you can't remove the ceiling, it will get too hot to send in your colonists to put the fire out. the few times i had an inside fire, i had to forbid my colonists to go there or they would have died from heat. had to wait for everything to burn out and stop on it's own.

[Patrykbono20]

you also need to make sure that the base you dug into the mountain has actually thick roof.
or you can get unlucky and have a 20man mechanoid raid drop right into your bedrooms.

also: don't build stuff that's flammable in a mountain base. if you can't remove the ceiling, it will get too hot to send in your colonists to put the fire out. the few times i had an inside fire, i had to forbid my colonists to go there or they would have died from heat. had to wait for everything to burn out and stop on it's own.

why we use the airlock with ventilation system

[Japzzi]

Most mountains have thick roofs I believe. And I understand that it takes a hell of a time mine it all out. But it is worth the wait. As I said before no fallout, maneaters or mortars. Those three things have made my colony get in real trouble real fast.

Building outside just seems so stupid these days..

[zandadoum]

Most mountains have thick roofs I believe. And I understand that it takes a hell of a time mine it all out. But it is worth the wait. As I said before no fallout, maneaters or mortars. Those three things have made my colony get in real trouble real fast.

Building outside just seems so stupid these days..

Just remember to let your colonists out for fresh air once in a while

[JimmyAgnt007]

Ive got a massive Dwarf Mountain Fortress.  Room for over 30 people and enough hydroponics to feed them all.  I also got a freezer full of 19000 corn and another with over a hundred large animals just in case.  I could deal with an endless Fallout event easy.  The only thing I do outside is a devilstrand farm on a rich soil patch and keep my cobras.  Ive got a few turrets and a defensive line but no killboxes.  A mortar park with 11 mortars that will blast away any attempt at siege before it has a chance to set up. 

Setting it up takes a lot of time.  Im around the 10 year mark, already launched 35 colonists into space and handed the keys to the remaining prisoners (dev mode recruit) but as long as you keep making stone blocks you can sell them for extra cash and not worry too much about the clutter.  The trick is to do it a bit at a time, dont overmine and make sure you got a lot of power.

[Limdood]

why build in the open?

for the same reason people play bases in the desert or ice sheets instead of just playing every single game on year-round growing temperate forests.  People create their own challenges in a game like this.  Sure i COULD hit random on my 3 colonists endlessly until i have 3 perfect colonists (or use EDB and get some max skill colonists), pick a perfect mountain map, and other things to make my playthru as easy as possible, but often its the challenge that makes the game more fun.

there are also flat maps that DO have benefits.  Easier access to and more animals, MUCH MUCH easier access to minerals (on a flat map, you often see an entire 8x8 "mini mountain" of pure plasteel, easy to find, easy to mine - same minerals, less stone to churn through), and finally, easier base planning - nothing like building an entryway into the mountain, getting 3 rooms in, then accidentally mining into a gigantic open area...even better if its flooded with water/mud, thus completely screwing your base plans.  Never happens on flat maps.

[Japzzi]

That is true. I also just made my base in the open for the ''challenge'' and for building a nice town.

[TheStache]

It is true that if your base is primarily in mountains, that events like the "siege" event wont happen as much (or even at all). The primary difficulty with mountain bases is pre-planning it out correctly can be difficult. Also it is taxing to start put because your villagers will have to live outside or in cramped spaces for awhile, however once a mountain base is carved out, it can be a fairly overpowered type of base, especially when it comes down to pirate raids (instead of setting up mortars, they usually send sappers, which are hilariously easy to disperse).

I think there needs to be more challenges associated with mountain base-ing, because right now the hardest thing about having a mountain base is keeping the temperature properly maintained, all else is fairly easy.

[RemingtonRyder]

Sappers can mine into your mountain base. Haven't seen them dig deeply into one, but it could happen!

[skullywag]

Ive had a sapper digging what i thought was quite far away into the mountain...i said to myself "derpy ai where you going?"  Couple of cells later "new area uncovered". A massive room 1 cell from my power rooms wall. They got in and rekd stuff before i coukd get people over, i fended it off but they did some serious damage, if id have had a zerg raid right after my defences were down....thankfully i didnt....

[zandadoum]

Ive had a sapper digging what i thought was quite far away into the mountain...i said to myself "derpy ai where you going?"  Couple of cells later "new area uncovered". A massive room 1 cell from my power rooms wall. They got in and rekd stuff before i coukd get people over, i fended it off but they did some serious damage, if id have had a zerg raid right after my defences were down....thankfully i didnt....

yah, AI has insane knowledge of your base and moutain

[DoctorNick]

I've got mixed feelings about the topic.

On one hand the RimWorld universe is a place where pirates, raiders, slavers and murderous killer robots from beyond the stars can literally fall out of the sky without any warning thirsty for your blood.

Not to mention the hostile tribe(s) of hunter-gatherers who's Gods you've inadvertently blasphemed, the periodic rains of blight bringing poisons from upwind and the local squirrels who from time to time decide that their hunger can only be satisfied by the flesh off of your bones.

I'd be living underground like a mole person also.

On the other hand having everyone default to building a scale model of Moria kind of strips some of the flavor out of the game.

But on the gripping hand how do you solve this problem without making it feel like you're punishing players for making the 'wrong' choice of how to build their colony?  Sure you could do things that make it harder and less desirable to live underground but you have to be careful balancing that.  It's essentially the question of carrot vs stick in motivation.

[Austupaio]

I personally play a mix. I'll have outposts, barracks, power stations and bunkers outdoors while my main bedrooms and stores are in a mountain. I believe that encouraging the placement of real outdoor buildings with concepts like beauty/good thoughts and practicality (such as solar panels) is the best way to go, along with a couple of bad events for underground bases.

Outside you get drop-pods (which are a damned death sentence sometimes and should be nerfed slightly) but perhaps inside you get giant carnivorous wurms.

Also make in-door sources of resources (such as hydroponics) slightly less efficient so you do have to go outside once in a blue moon, unless you really work to make an efficient self-contained system. Hydroponics is very easy to set-up, which is fair I suppose, but I feel it's too easy to make perfectly sufficient and endlessly sustainable.

Also also, I know that the end game of the digestive system is something games rarely like to address but adding a sort of sewage/plumbing system so you have to have pipelines to outdoors water supplies (unless you find mountain springs!). I'll often build several geothermal plants that are far from my mountain compound and pave small paths for the conduits. I need to patrol these to keep it secure and operable, which is a good gameplay element.