Disease infection rates: need of a re-balance?

[Shurp]

(Its not helped by Components BTW, and needing a skill level 10 for producing them. I have lots of structures set up for use but can't afford to equip the rooms or maintain them.)

I'm sorry, *what*?  In addition to gold, plasteel, lots of components, and gobs of research, I *also* need a colonist with a crafting skill > 10 to end the component hell?

I may go back to playing alpha 12.

[Listy]

(Its not helped by Components BTW, and needing a skill level 10 for producing them. I have lots of structures set up for use but can't afford to equip the rooms or maintain them.)

I'm sorry, *what*?  In addition to gold, plasteel, lots of components, and gobs of research, I *also* need a colonist with a crafting skill > 10 to end the component hell?

I may go back to playing alpha 12.

Yup, came as a shock for me when I brought a Component assembly bench to get that message.
I thought, Ah-ha Component hell ends... then nope.

[Listy]

More on diseases.

My Arid shrub land colony (different install, different machine) has had literally only something like five diseases in its 18 months.

However I get back to my main colony for the first time in about five days and within 30 seconds of booting the colony; Here have some Flu!



Did I mention dual infections?


Oh and the above is not counting the two Prisoners with flu, one also has Mechanites. So imagine if I'd not had prisoner's...
As to the earlier question about if its Jungle or not. Well wildlife includes deers, bears and Cougars, and no Monkies or Cobras, so yeah temperate forest.

In the interests of checking if this is the Storyteller is having a senior moment or if I'm imagining it, here's the save file:
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/gl2jdnlne2fsy1c/AABqGBR5Q6gGU-iSb3iFsF0ia?dl=0

[Boston]

Yeah diseases were, and often still are, the #1 killer of humanity, for as long as we have been humans.

Imagine that?

The in-game rate of disease infection is often directly tied to the cleanliness of the living environment. If you have got a lot of dirt and filth around, your colonists are gonna get sick. Have someone on cleaning detail, and the rate of disease infection will go down.

it is also tied into the Biome in which your colony is located in. Temperate forests can be very wet places (even if it doesn't show up on the game map), and mosquitoes and other vermin are a big problem. A large reason for the importation of African slaves to the Colonial US was due to Africans innate (not perfect, but higher than Europeans, due to exposure) resistance to malaria.  Arid shrublands are drier, and thusly, tend to have less vermin.

[Listy]

The in-game rate of disease infection is often directly tied to the cleanliness of the living environment. If you have got a lot of dirt and filth around, your colonists are gonna get sick. Have someone on cleaning detail, and the rate of disease infection will go down.

A) I don't believe it is. Infections of wounds are, but not diseases.
B) The save game file is right there, go on show me the filthy base.

it is also tied into the Biome in which your colony is located in.

Correct, however the only one with an elevated chance of infection is the Jungle, as Tynan pretty much said earlier in this thread. All the factors you list have no baring in the game, I mean Rimworld is great and all but I don't think its quite gotten to that level of environment simulator just yet.

[Mathenaut]

There needs to be some kind of rhyme and reason behind diseases, not just 'lolrng'.

They should be consequences of environmental factors. Some of the new diseases seriously need some scaling back. Going years with no end in sight isn't more immersive. Mostly just kills it.

[Shurp]

I consider it "immersive" in the sense of "immersed in the ridiculousness that is Rimworld".  Which I consider actually fun.  It's entertaining to keep a colony up and running when you have five colonists and three are in bed with flu/plague/whatever.  And the other two have weird parasitic infections.  As long as they can run outside to turn on the turrets before the mechanoids show up I don't mind.

[Mathenaut]

Yeah diseases were, and often still are, the #1 killer of humanity, for as long as we have been humans.

Imagine that?

Disease is about the least likely thing to kill you when you have ready access to medicine. So yeah, ancient colonies and the 3rd world still have these problems. You also don't see the Amish killing over in droves every flu season either.

Penicillin alone completely craters the attrition rate of diseases, so no. Diseases are deadly when they cannot be treated, not just arbitrarily lethal because reasons. Again, realism makes this easier, not harder.

[Negocromn]

I got attacked by two gigantic tribal waves with a few hours distance of eachother, some colonists got killed, my base turned into a complete mess and most importantly, everything was very very dirty for ~10 days when I kinda finished reorganizing everything. And then everyone started getting sick, first with malaria, then with plague, then more plague, almost everyone got seriously sick in a couple of days. Before this my base had always been clean and I think a couple people got the flu and that's it.

3 people out of 16 not sick with something

[Shurp]

So is dirt actually affecting disease rates?  That would be awesome if true.

But it's more likely the RNG just hates you

[Negocromn]

there's a post by Rahjital saying it has no relation and I don't see why not assume he's right

Are the cleaniess of the place and the disease rate related? Because I get the new infections really often, and only the inside of my base is clean, the outside where they grow corpses, craft some things and walk alot

Looking at the code, no, they aren't, cleanliness only matters for infections. The only thing that can prevent a pawn from getting diseased is if he already has the disease, or still has some leftover immunity from when he was last ill.

I posted before reading the thread and it sure felt like the dirtiness was related to the diseases, probably just the RNG doing its work

[Listy]

I posted before reading the thread and it sure felt like the dirtiness was related to the diseases, probably just the RNG doing its work

In your case I think the Story teller (a pox upon her) wanted to poke you just a little, but saw that a full scale raid would be over kill. So she went to the soft attack options in her collection.