Raid Balance

[Gremdavel]

I get that you disagree with me, but that does not mean my feedback is invalid.  The scenario editor is a wonderful tool for discovering things about the game -- it can be used as a user-driven QA environment, great for discovering edge cases.  Perhaps the game's behavior which I described is exactly what's intended.  That may easily be the case.  But that's up to the developers.  They can use my feedback to make a judgement call based on their vision for the game.  The developers may disagree that wealth should be weighted differently, but that doesn't mean I shouldn't give that feedback based on extreme cases I can set up with the game's own tools.

[night777]

Raids are calculated in A15C taking into account colonist count, and wealth in buildings.  The game is also supposed to take into account wealth in items, which means that you should be getting that type of raid regardless of whether you have stone lying around, or have built walls out of it.  Currently, a bug causes the game to not take into account the wealth in items when calculating raids.
  Setting up deadfall traps, even if they are out of wood, would help defend against this type of raid.  Getting turrets up and running would also help.

I tried removing the story teller from random to the one that allows you to have some breathing room in-between conflicts. Nothing changed. I had a toxic fallout then a volcanic winter, then a raid which was godlike with top tier weapons and gear and additionally outnumbering us. Sorry, but this game is completely imbalanced. Seeing my whole colony fall because of something I couldn't even fight back with, is ridiculous. Deadfall traps are also useless. The enemy is not stupid enough to go to them and it seems like my colonist are the one ones who run into deadfall traps, so I don't even bother.

Game is fun, but there is an awful lot of lategame content which is very difficult to get to. I'm also getting so fed up with having incompetent colonists, who can't haul, can't clean, can't fight, just too frustrating. Rimworld isn't funny anymore, it's getting annoying. Raids come, don't stop destroying your base until its gone, then they don't just steal your resource, but also all your colonists that are capable of recovering what you have left. Surviving with 1-2 colonist, is a guarantee loss unless you cheat. Also having two raids one after the other with intense equipment and numbers, nah no balance within the game. Not in any story teller. The way raids are calculated, just isn't fair. Also creating turrets? With so many wind turbines and batteries, I can barely keep my base powered.

Yes baby, the game is meant to kick your ass and actually have losing conditions. Try an easier difficulty.

[carbon]

Second update for my quantitative raid tracking colony covering D65 - D120. First update (D0 - D65) can be found here for those interested.

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Non-Raid overview:

Given I'm on Randy Intense, a lull in the action was inevitable. The second summer and fall were that lull. One infestation occurred on D67, but I didn't even bother to include it on the raid table since it was far enough away to not present an active threat. Dispatched with only one minor bite from a scarab.

A slaver must have heard my earlier calls for more manpower, because they arrived with two slave who actually had decent stats for once. Bought both eagerly and put them to work.

Winter was tough as far as weather. Had recurring brown outs due to lack of sunlight. Repeatedly forced to shut off nearly everything but the heaters to keep my plants and colonists warm. Had enough wood fuel to get through it and a few solar flares without cutting things too close. Power situation is much improved by end of the second year, so I don't anticipate a repeat going forward.

I'm still a bit lacking on things to sell (growing things being tough in the tundra). So my wealth and ability to buy shiny things has been reduced compared to what I'm used to, but I have all the necessities at this point.  We're definitely in mid-game territory.

Ler, the colonist who keeps hitting on all my females, finally has a lover. Maybe he'll finally stop having a -15 mood de-buff from all the rejections. Makes my life easier.

The colonists must have sensed the two year anniversary of the colony. They started a party to celebrate (pictured below).

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Raid overview:

The first raid after the summer lull was on D81, but I ended up being so disappointed by it that I willingly accepted a request for help from a model that same day. The second raid was certainly beefier, but still not above the 2:1 ratio. They were dispatched with only a few bits of wall knocked down and singed trees.

The D84 warg raid was interesting at least. They slaughtered a visiting trader and a prisoner I had released seconds before they came. However, so long as they are spread out around my base, it's easy enough to pick them off one at a time. Took 24h to do, but I dispatched them all without casualties. I still never figured out where the last two wargs went.

Compared to wargs, D93 muffalos running through thick snow are a joke. Poor traders.

The D100 Poison ship is the sort of event I would savescum if I were a less reputable player. I should have just taken potshots at it with sniper rifles until they were all dead. Instead, I stood way too close to it behind some walls and hoped a single EMP would somehow protect me. I realized what a horrible mistake that was when 6 mechs popped out on all different sides of the ship. The EMPer managed to stun a single scyther before he and another colonist were inferno cannoned out of cover and quickly gunned down. I tried to be a hero and save one of the downed, but my surrogate hero met a similar fate as the two before. Don't EVER be a hero when mechs are involved.

I really thought I was going to be completely overrun. Even Randy thought so. He spawned friendlies to "help", but 3 of the 4 only had pistols and they spawned on the opposite side of the map.
Thanks for nothing, Randy!

Good news is I was actually smart enough to position 2 snipers back from the main group to add supplemental sniper fire to the mix. They at least helped take out a few and provide distractions for the rest. A little praying and spraying and I somehow managed to pull through with only the initial two dead (of a total of 7 seven combat). My surrogate hero actually made a full recovery, but his savior took some flame to the eye.

Boomrat raids are fun. But again, spread out, in thick snow, not nearly the terrible threat you think they should be. Thick snow is the MVP of my colony this year.

The D115 sapper raid was the first sapper to actually do some real sapping. Three grenadiers concentrating on one spot can cut through slate walls like butter. Didn't help that I had two friendly fire incidents early on. My doors are still mostly unpowered stone, so repositioning to counter an enemy that's made it inside was tough. They made it as far as my prison before I could get a decent firing position on them. Sadly, one of the prisoners who died was the grandfather of Ler, who already lost his father in the first year. Ler is probably smart to choose non-violence.

Now I have fallout to deal with. Not that it matters much. Tundra never had many plants or animals to start with.

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Year #2 Major casualties:
2 Deaths
1 Burned eye (replaced with bionic)
1 Destroyed big toe

Raid table and current image of base attached.

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[carbon]

Finishing up my raid tracking colony:
D0 - D65
D65 - D120
D120 - D183(end) is here

Save game at endpoint can be found below.

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Non-raid overview:

Spent the first half of the summer indoors due to fallout. For late Summer and early Fall, I did the best I could to greatly expand my indoor growing operation before the cold set in again. Aimed to ease cashflow problems with excess food and goods to sell. My stonecutters struggled to keep up as the rock chunks were getting farther and farther from base.

Finally finished the Deep drilling scanner which took ungodly amounts of research since I'm a Tribal. Spent most of the Winter trying to locate a plasteel deposit in preparation for building a ship out of here. Found one after about 12 exploratory drill rigs hit steel instead. With that running and my grow operation producing lots of food to sell, my wealth really starts spiking. In the first 10 seasons it reached 150k, that doubles to 300k within another 2 seasons.

I get ready to build the ship, but I still haven't had a psychic ship land at any point, so I call in a set of 4 exotic traders at the same time. After some price shopping, my man "Kazz" hooks me up with an AI core for a "measly" 3,806 silver. Sure, Kazz, whatever you say. I also start buying up bionics around that time point.

Turns out ships are actually really steel-costly to build. I desperately try to pump out enough of the stuff during the Spring to make the 3rd year anniversary deadline, but it just can't be done. Probably could have made it if I hadn't decided to include all the cosmetic enhancements on my ship, but spending all this effort just to leave in a flying pogo stick simply wouldn't do.

There was another infestation in there at some point. Too far and too exposed to be memorable.

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Raid overview:

Randy sends a pitiful 5 raiders on D120, who stand around like idiots getting fallout sickness before attacking.

Two sets of mech raids on D132 and D147. Can't figure out why, but all the mechs have only 60% movement despite being in perfect health. In the first instance, Randy tries to favor the mechs by giving them a manhunter hare as back-up. In the second instance, he sends me both friendlies and visitors, but counterbalances a bit by invoking a Zzztt... event while the fight is playing out. I have enough high quality weaponry at this point that the mechs get dealt with without much drama.

I captured a friendly tribal in the D147 battle to try to get at least one tribal raid by the end, but it wasn't to be.

D171 raid got partly distracted by my exploratory drill rigs far from base. The raid in general is a good example of why raids simply don't do as much damage once you have decent weaponry. Once you can essentially guarantee most of the enemies take at least modest damage in the initial confrontation, they are hobbled by wounds the rest of the fight and never pose a threat.

Psychic ship at D177 was too late to provide the AI core to my ship. I wasn't going to take the chance of a close quarter exchange like in year 2. I tried setting up some explosive traps around it and used exclusively snipers to engage. The traps were really lackluster. Only one was triggered and did pitiful damage. Good news is 4 decent quality snipers make mechs a non-threat.

One last raid on D179 looked to be a bruiser. 4 Triple rocket launchers (triprocks) made me think I might actually be in trouble. Then, 3 seconds later, two traders I had called a few days earlier drop in. One of them was only a few tiles away from the raiders. The trader AI really can't deal with threats in-transit, so they were largely on the receiving end of the punishment, but at least they baited all 4 triprocks without me having to lift a finger. What was left of the raid didn't hold up to the first exchange of gunfire I had with them.

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No major casualties this year, so the totals for the colony are:

3 Dead (1 to sniper fire, 2 to inferno mechs)
2 Permanent injuries (both bionic'd by the end)

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Synopsis:

At no point did Randy Intense ever send a 2:1, Pirates:Colonists ratio raid or higher at me. It's possible that's due in part to my lower wealth (tundra is harsh for tribals), but playing on an easier biome would simply have made getting better weapons and gear a breeze. I never did unlock making charge rifles or power armor. Not that it mattered.

Of the deaths, all were essentially preventable.

Manhunter raids, while there's snow on the ground, not a threat.

Friendlies, while helpful in theory, need to come more prepared for whatever threat they are dealing with and spawn closer.

Even if a woman rejects your advances the first 25 times, you should keep asking. She'll marry you eventually. 

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Raid table, base at endpoint and my Cadillac of flying pogo sticks attached below. Save file will be one post down (attachment limits).

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[carbon]

The save file in case someone wants to extract harder data than what I've provided.

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