About Infestations

[deathstar]

So Bug Infestations are now in to prevent us from having super safe cave-bases. This is a design-choice I can wholeheartedly support. But do you think they are balanced?
After having done some research, there are no restrictions to where infestations can occur aside from it being under a mountain, no matter how small. There is also nothing you can do to discourage bugs from appearing. My current map is on a temperate forest with small hills. I dug partly into one of these hills to make a room that is mostly outside the mountain into a square. I get frequent infestations in that single room, despite it being the busiest part of my whole colony.
I propose further requirements for infestations, perhaps a certain depth should be needed before hives can spawn, that way only caves would be affected. Furthermore, there should be something you can do to make rooms less prone to infestation. Thinking "How would the bugs get in?", I layed out some concrete floor and replaced the walls with strong stone structures. Of course, none of this seems to have any effect currently.

What do you think? Should hives stay as they are? Should hives continue to spawn in lived-in areas?

[viperwasp]

Since I commonly browse Mantis and the Official Rimworld Bug Forum. I have seen others report this or suggest something be done. And it seems it's being addressed. Of course in a future Alpha. I may post a link to the topic if I find it. I think the solution was something like bugs won't spawn unless there is a certain amount of Mountain tiles around it etc. However that may not be how it's addressed the Devs are working on something it seems.

[ChimpX]

I agree wholeheartedly; there should be more logic to it. At the very least, there should be some kind of warning that the bugs are coming... maybe another item on the research tree? Seismic sensors or something?

Bear in mind that this is the very first iteration of the infestation / social / trade nerfage; it's only to be expected that this Alpha will need tweaking.

[vek329]

I don't even think the mountain tiles make any difference. I had one appear pretty deep. It doesn't help that these bugs are pretty tough, I sent one of my tamed bears in there and they tore him apart in seconds, I don't even want to think about what could've happened to a colonist without a good personal shield.

My current strategy to deal with them is to just turn whatever room they spawned in into an oven with some Molotov and then restrict the area so that my colonist don't run in like idiots trying to put out the fire. The down side to this is that the whole room the bugs infested will be burnt down and will need to be rebuilt, this is especially bad if they infest an important room like a stockpile. This also doesn't work too well with wooden walls.

Pic related is one said infestation, thankfully it was just a room in expansion so I didn't lose anything except my brave bear.

[attachment deleted by admin - too old]

[MisterPibbles]

I was under the impression that you wouldn't get infestations in well lit areas.  The only one I've seen since implementing that strategy came when all my lights went out during an eclipse.

[homemacai]

I agree, it should be either balanced by time of colony, or deepness of mine. Otherwise, everytime i get an infestation just load to a previous save. Making the bugs pretty uselles, as they are pretty unfair.

[Devon_v]

The bugs are very easy to kill with massed firepower or simply sniped at range. They are however too random in when and how they can appear. Punishing dwarfing is one thing, making caves useless is another thing altogether. I would agree that depth should play a major factor.

[ReZpawner]

I was under the impression that you wouldn't get infestations in well lit areas.  The only one I've seen since implementing that strategy came when all my lights went out during an eclipse.

Sadly, this is not the case. As my not-so-nice-anymore-grow-room can attest to. It's been suggested to the devs as a possible thing in the future, but it's purely from players. No word as of yet to my knowledge of it being implemented in the future.