Loading Up the Armory

[Kyle23011]

So , I'm relatively new to RimWorld so this may seem like a stupid question but , Should i leave my Colonists equipped with the rifles all the time? Or should i leave all my weapons in a equipment room? Sure if they have it equipped all the time they're always ready. But Its extremely annoying when a Wild Boomrat or Muffalo kills one on my colonist and I have a Valuable M-24 just laying out there. What do you recommend?

[palandus]

For the time being I'd suggest having a stockpile that can store weapons and have weapons on the colonists at all times. In the future they may be able to use equipment instead of weapons, but for now, carry a weapon on them at all times. An M24, isn't very effective against boomrats as you will get at most 1 shot off (maybe 2) before it gets to melee range.

[OobleckTheGreen]

My colonists are always armed. One thing you can do to mitigate damage from boomrats (and raiders, for that matter) is to have an double outer wall leading to your settlement that serves as a long straight corridor. Make it the only way into the settlement. You can improve it by having your colonists drop a block of debris at the corridor entrance to slow down travel coming in and out of the corridor. At the settlement-side of the corridor, put down enough sandbags for your colonists to hide behind. You should now have a long shooting range.

Any animal that goes crazy will automatically choose the corridor as the easiest path into the settlement. As soon as you get the message that an animal has gone nuts, place 2-3 shooters behind your sandbags and wait for the creature to enter the corridor. Creatures never get much past halfway down the corridor before they're shot to pieces.

Here's an example:

[palandus]

An interesting corridor idea; I like it!

[Nasikabatrachus]

I recommend pistols and shotguns for daily carrying. Things like R-4 charge rifles can be downright counterproductive when a boomrat is on the scene, nevermind frag grenades or molotov cocktails. The Lee-Enfield can also be useful in such situations, but mostly as a backup. You may want to have at least a couple colonists ready for real battle, though, as the process of re-arming your mans can take valuable time away from preparing emergency defenses.

[OobleckTheGreen]

I find there are really only 2 serious weapon choices: M-24 and M-16. The pulse laser is cool but seems to do more missing than anything else. All the incendiary weapons do more harm than good. I set my armory shelves to hold M-16's and M-24's only, and my launch pads to hold all other weapon types, which I simply sell off.

[Coenmcj]

I seem to be having some good luck with 18 or so colonists on Randy random armed with nothing but R-4's, I'll switch on the dev tools so I can have a look at this, wouldn't make sense that an ancient gun like the M16 could possibly be better than an R-4.

[Ender]

I seem to be having some good luck with 18 or so colonists on Randy random armed with nothing but R-4's, I'll switch on the dev tools so I can have a look at this, wouldn't make sense that an ancient gun like the M16 could possibly be better than an R-4.

I completely agree, i find R-4's to be much better, i tend to do a mix of arming my colonists, first of all EVERYONE gets at least a pistol, at all times, but everyone else that deserves a better weapon allways carries them, which means a good mixture of my epic gunners with M-24's and my good gunners with R-4s / M-16's

[Tynan]

The M-16 has a slightly longer range; the R-4 does more damage.