Faction relations, more raid types

[Esphaine]

Raids expend a handful to dozens of people; that's potentially dozens of laborers, hunters, craftsmen, walking food sources, etc. risked by hostile factions in each attempt to raid your colony. In the early stages it makes sense for opportunistic factions to send small parties to kidnap people for ransom or seize your technology, but it makes a lot less sense for tribesmen to send over a hundred able-bodied men and women to assault a plasteel fortress with bows and spears. So my suggestion is this: give other factions an interest stat and a fear stat (or whatever names would fit better).

Interest is the stat of "why this faction wants to attack you". Let's say it's only been a season and your initial three have set up some wooden buildings and some solar generators, with little in the way of defenses. The place looks bad, feels bad, and has almost no wealth. Hostile tribes would be interested in your electricity, but pirates and outlander towns would likely see nothing worth taking. Meanwhile, an industrial-level compound would definitely attract the attention of all factions, and a spacer-tech settlement would generate high interest. Basically, higher-tech level factions will be more likely to raid you as you progress. They will also potentially send different types of raids (more on that later).

Fear is "why this faction isn't going to". A hard-fought battle with lots of damaged property resulting in the raiders fleeing will slightly raise the faction's fear of messing with you. A successful raid and the passage of time both lower this. Low fear means the faction will raid more often; higher fear means they might even actively try to make peace with you. If fifty tribesmen arrive at the outskirts of a heavily-fortified colony and get torn to pieces by artillery, traps, turrets, and high-tech weaponry and only a single traumatized survivor returns with tales of horror, the village's reaction really shouldn't be "let's send a hundred next season!"

Next up is reasons for raiding. Right now, all the raids more or less focus on killing your colonists and damaging your property. There isn't even a part in the event text saying why a faction is attacking; mechanoids and tribals have the same goals. I suggest that each time a raid/siege happens, it also tells you why. Depending on the faction's fear/interest and your wealth and any recent interactions you've had with them, you'll get a different raid type. Some reasons could include:

-Looting. Happens at low interest. A few raiders have ranged weapons, but nobody is armored; the armed ones will try to pin your defensive forces (taking care to steer clear of turrets) while the looters spread out and attempt to break or climb your walls to steal the first valuable item they see. It could be your precious stock of luciferium, your legendary assault hammer, or the grand sculpture you have outside. The looters are not armed, but have a higher chance of having fast walker/jogger to facilitate the looting process.

-Slaving. Happens at low-medium interest. This is the standard raid where the enemy storms your colony and will leave after downing a few people to take as hostages/slaves.

-Steal materials. Happens at medium interest and medium-high fear. The raiders are primarily concerned with dismantling your fancy walls, your geothermal generators, and your unattended mortars. They take a very spread-out approach, wear personal shields, and wield melee weapons. Pack muffalos or other large beasts of burden will be stationed a bit further back for the raiders to deposit their ill-gotten gains. Once everyone is burdened down with materials, the raiders will attempt to flee. They do NOT want a fight of any sort; any raider with aggro will run for cover, attempt to kite, and generally distract your colonists from dealing with the many other raiders.

-Overrun/Total War/Long Siege. Happens at high interest, low fear, probably only on higher difficulties too. A special raid type where initially a few guys will arrive hauling steel, components, etc. They set up a semi-permanent settlement at the edge of the map - beds, power, sandbags, mortars, and turrets. Every day more raiders arrive carrying with them more food and materials. Some raiders do nothing but maintain the place; the rest will attempt to wear down your colony. Between constant shelling, raiding parties thrice a day, and scattered looters, your colonists will struggle to find time to even eat, let alone sleep or work. However, they'll all retreat if they take too many losses in a single day. Should only happen to large, wealthy colonies.

-Extermination. A special raid type that happens if you especially piss off a faction. This could be requesting a trade caravan just to mug it, or killing a faction's leader, or some other event; either way, it should involve a conscious decision of "fuck these guys" by the player to trigger. Enemies spread out into several small squads with the singular goal of killing ALL your colonists. They will attack generators left unprotected and dismantle steel cabling to deny your base power. Sapper squadrons will make your defensive perimeter porous as a sponge. Lone snipers in each squad will punish you for trying to approach. They will even execute downed colonists if given the chance and will fight to the last man if it means taking down another of your filthy colonists with them. This should be a challenge that the player invites onto him/herself. Even mechanoids aren't this merciless (currently).

Those are all the ideas I have currently. Feel free to share other ideas for raid types.

[NickB0]

-Overrun/Total War/Long Siege. Happens at high interest, low fear, probably only on higher difficulties too. A special raid type where initially a few guys will arrive hauling steel, components, etc. They set up a semi-permanent settlement at the edge of the map - beds, power, sandbags, mortars, and turrets. Every day more raiders arrive carrying with them more food and materials. Some raiders do nothing but maintain the place; the rest will attempt to wear down your colony. Between constant shelling, raiding parties thrice a day, and scattered looters, your colonists will struggle to find time to even eat, let alone sleep or work. However, they'll all retreat if they take too many losses in a single day. Should only happen to large, wealthy colonies.

I really like this one. I think it might be better if they didn't have mortars though. In a normal siege you feel the need to deal with them immediately because mortars can cause devastation in no time. I would like this type of raid to be more like attrition; slowly ware down the defending colonist by blocking them inside their walls and starving them of resources.

Some measures would have to be made to prevent players from exploiting and profiting from the daily raiding parties, like maybe having the raiders gear disintegrates on death or brain implants that kill them if they are captured.

[JuicyPVP]

dismantle steel cabling to deny your base power.

Absolutely not... Unless a way to burry power lines to prevent this comes first. lol.

Otherwise I like it especially the long-siege.

[A Friend]

You can already bury it under walls, but that doesn't seem much of a problem unless all your power sources are exposed outside.

Anyways, an idea I had a while back.

Now just imagine these scenario,

1. You just started the game and the strong pirate group arrives with charge rifles and captured centipedes. They force you to give them a set amount of resources every week or they butcher you. But in turn, they scare off the weak raiders and the paranoid outlanders won't trade with you.

Months pass, the resources the raiders want is getting absurd and you're getting sick of it. You get the option to contact the weak raiders who also hates their guts and strike a deal. A day before the strong group arrives to collect your offer. The weak raiders sends about 10-20 pirates waiting around your home zones and behind some mountains and trees as ambush. The strong group arrives on your front door. You deny them their demands and they get obliterated by numerous gunfire.

Assuming they're still alive. The weak group may reveal that they sabotaged your power systems and turn on you or they may just leave with the strong group's weapons. But either way, the strong group doesn't threaten you anymore.

https://ludeon.com/forums/index.php?topic=17912.msg197338#msg197338 - The rest of the post isn't really raid-focused but still concerns making factions more interesting.

[O Negative]

I've always like the idea of raid motives. "Pay me or we'll burn your little village to the ground" -> "No" -> *raids ensue* seems nice to me haha

[MeowRailroad]

This would be nice to have, it seems ridiculous that the tribes just keep sending people in to be killed over and over and over.

[CodeRen]

Yeah he needs to flesh out raids a little more. A lot more. Itll make for awesome stories then just "I got raided and..." to "They showed up and demanded I hand over 2 colonists, so i.."

[BetaSpectre]

Cutting power is actually not that big of a deal if you place a battery next to your turret. And with generators you can focus power internally. Or just expand enough to keep your geotherms etc inside your area.

Personally with the right set up sieges are kind of a dumb set up. Because I can see the people gathering around, and immediately lob 8 shells before they even have a chance to set up. Not to mention the fact they waste time beating fires, or cutting trees.

Let's say I lob 16 shells into a mass of war like enemies before they can fire 1? I Imagine they'd take causalities.

I find a fear mechanic interesting, though IMO warfare should happen if faction relations hit -100. With each war repelled it would have a truce resetting to 0. Pirates being pirates should demand tribute seasonally, if denied relations drop. With each member killed IMO they should lose relations, and gain fear equally. This would mean seasonal and predictable attacks with a logical basis of occurrence.