Even a Small Skirmish is Only Half The Battle

[Elixiar]

This must have happened for quite a few of the past alphas now though I don't exactly remember when.
I dont tend to use turrets very often. If I do manage to get some up, a raider with grenades or a triple rocket launcher (I never save scummed until one of those BS weapons insta-murdered my colonists all the time without much room for counter play) destroys them in one fight.

So this leaves me relying on my pawns to head to the front lines. Sometimes the battles can be tough but only once every few skirmishes usually do some colonists not make it back. They are not the issue, they are dead.
The problem is what happens after a battle.
Everyone is injured, the base has likely been breached so dead lay scattered,
buildings damaged and dirt and blood is all round.

Then the spiral begins, a never ending event of a colonist going mad, being beaten up, sent to bed, only for another to go mad and injure the first 2. Only for another and so on, so on.

How the hell do I get around this because sometimes it gets so bad that the cycle never really ends and micromanaging that in particular becomes a real ball ache to the point I (regrettably) save scum to before the fight simply because I cannot deal with my colony on a path of self destruction after a battle.
How do others deal with this?

Maybe the colony could get a short burst of morale to counter this? E.G *Not today* - "The colony survived another assault, we were lucky."

A mental break is one thing but I find the game turning un-fun after 20 breaks in 5 minutes. I want my pawns to be at the front of the action, but the penalty for getting them hurt has too much post battle cons, especially when they can't pull themselves together and end up destroyed by the next wave the colony isn't ready to fight.

Sorry for the long read.
TL;DR - The colony kills itself after an attack.

[Shurp]

Beer.  Lots and lots and lots of beer.  If you have to, get them so drunk that they vomit and pass out.

Don't forget to hand out wood logs to beat up any troublemakers with.

[Boston]

I, for one, don't let the fight come to my colony. I go out to them, and use "guerrilla warfare" to wound, tire and string the enemy out. Lead the enemy through traps, over rough terrain, let them get separated and frightened and wounded, and they become much easier to deal with.

It is a hell of a lot of micromanaging, to be sure ( I sure as hell love that pause button), but it works. I have 6 pawns, on a Boreal Forest Mountain map, and I have only had the enemy get to my actual colony once. There, there are overlapping fields of fire from all the outbuildings onto a central plaza ("common house", where the kitchen and dining facility is, then individual houses, and a barn/workshop area.) There is no cover in the central plaza, so 6 pawns armed with rifles and shotguns can set up a hell of a crossfire.

The one raid that actually made it to my colony was a tribal raid, and even then I drove them off through sheer weight of fire (and fire in general. The plaza is dirt, so the only thing that could burn were the bodies. Some molotovs + tightly packed tribals = bad time.) I didn't even bother "guerrilla warfare"-ing them beforehand.

[Limdood]

to combat the negativity spiral:

1) have an assigned doctor...the best doctor in the colony...get them bionic arms if possible eventually to speed things up even more.  The doctor does NOT get drafted (you'll need to monitor his position to keep him safe or use special restrictions)...even better, set his work priorities to SLEEP as soon as the attack starts.

The doctor's job is to IMMEDIATELY wake up and tend every injury ASAP after the battle.  To make this easier and faster, be sure that there is a medicine stockpile in the hospital room (if you don't have a hospital, they can be easily made in any biome with trees...building with a bunch of beds all set medical...cake).  Make the hospital as nice as possible to add a mood while they're there.

2) have a FAST pawn (at least no movement penalties, at best jogger with bio legs) also undrafted, set to sleep (in a pinch it can be someone who fought, wasn't injured, and has some positive mood or more resilient mental breaks) during the fight.  Have him set to clean as top priority, haul as secondary priority.  manually micromanage his hauling of the bodies during the "cleaning" part of his after-raid job...this will minimize the number of people seeing the bodies later.

This gets you
- shorter pain moods
- less risk of infection
- less ugliness after a raid
- a minimum of "observed a corpse"

Next:
3) set all colonists to mandatory joy time (except mr. doctor) after the raid, unless they have no mood issues.  24 hour joy time colonists will still sleep if tired, and still work if maxed on joy.
4) drink beer if you use it (i don't, in my opinion its not worth the binges)


the biggest mood losses after a raid come from:
-losing close pawns/animals
-being in pain
-being tired
-being hungry
-seeing corpses and messes
-losing joy

These should solve most of those.

[Menuhin]

I'm definitely familiar with the problem you have, though honestly i feel like its gotten much better within the last 2 alphas.  You mention ugly environment so it sounds like you should consider spending a little more beautifying the areas around your base. 

But 2 major things that have can help with happiness substantially in this last alpha is
1: stop butchering people.  I know its a fair income loss to do so, but the mood hit is fairly large. 
2: Make sarcophagus and bury someone.  Its a very easy way to give a colony wide mood buff.

[Shurp]

Burying dead raiders in a sarcophagus gives a mood bonus?

Or execute a useless colonist and bury him for a mood bonus?

[christhekiller]

Yeah. As Limbood said you'll want a colonists whose top priority is doctoring. As long as you get your colonists healed up and moving again all should be well fairly soon. So long as they're injuries are healing, they have a fair bit of joy and they have food they should be okay (baring any mood debuffs like Volatile or Pessimist)

[codyo]

I suppose the main thing is to avoid sending all of your colonists into a fight. Have straight up non-military colonists who do all the rescuing work and fixing things.
I've put military animals, like cougars and bears on colonists to protect them while drafted. They absorb some bullets as well.
You're using walls as cover right? Walls work very well in protecting people.

To maximize your turrets, try to force enemies to run into their line of fire. Rather than have them stay outside the zone of fire and destroy the turret. (As soon as an enemy rounds a corner they should meet turret fire. Keep in mind to put traps on corners of walls to prevent enemies from using it as safe cover.

[sadpickle]

to combat the negativity spiral:

~snip~

My God man, you have this down to a science. Bravo.

[Argelle]

Very nice thread to pick up defence ideas, thanks to you

There, there are overlapping fields of fire from all the outbuildings onto a central plaza (...) There is no cover in the central plaza, so 6 pawns armed with rifles and shotguns can set up a hell of a crossfire.

So I guess my (only) turret should not be surrounded by stones?
Another flaw in my design: does stones prevent the turret to shot with accuracy?
At first I make my colonists grab the outside stones because I saw reader sniper taking cover behind it (or it look like it). But then it works the other way round, the turret may be hancapicated by stones. The other idea was to make a slow down zone around the turret so that suicide reader don't come to explose it. May be not the smartest idea.

[Boston]

Very nice thread to pick up defence ideas, thanks to you

There, there are overlapping fields of fire from all the outbuildings onto a central plaza (...) There is no cover in the central plaza, so 6 pawns armed with rifles and shotguns can set up a hell of a crossfire.

So I guess my (only) turret should not be surrounded by stones?
Another flaw in my design: does stones prevent the turret to shot with accuracy?
At first I make my colonists grab the outside stones because I saw reader sniper taking cover behind it (or it look like it). But then it works the other way round, the turret may be hancapicated by stones. The other idea was to make a slow down zone around the turret so that suicide reader don't come to explose it. May be not the smartest idea.

Yep, rubble provides cover, around 40%. Less than sandbags, but still significant.

http://rimworldwiki.com/wiki/Cover

[Argelle]

Nice wiki article, I did not spot it earlier.
I had a troubling question reading it:
How is cover programmed?

sniper--stone----------------------------------poor colonist

Stone gives cover to the sniper so his shots are not affected, but poor colonist's one are.

sniper---------------------------------stone--smart colonist

This time it's reversed: the sniper is less likely to shot the colonist.

If all he above is true, then

sniper----------------------------stone-turret

is ok for my automatic turret?

[Aarkreinsil]

I found that mental breaks actually delete most, if not all of the negative thoughts that someone has. For example the "I butchered humanlike" or "Sold prisoner into slavery" etc. are gone after a break, even though they should have stayed for another week or so.

So yeah, using high quality leather chairs around your dining table, and high quality beds for maximum comfort go a looooong way in keeping people happy. Always use your best construction dude to actually build furniture, just in case. And you don't even have to bury the corpses, just put them behind a wall where no one can see them.

[Rahjital]

Mental breaks removing thoughts has been confirmed to be a bug, so don't rely on it too much.

[Elixiar]

Wow! thanks for all the amazing tips!
I'll put these into practice.

Unfortunately the battle makes its way into my streets whether I dispatch colonists or not, also, that tactic tends not to work on zerg rushing Raiders.
The beer is definitely a really overlooked idea by me. I normally see it as a commodity though I should maybe start to see it as a necessity.