Slapping the Sappers

[b0rsuk]

You can harass them with long range weapons as they're getting close to the wall. If they only have medium range weapons, survival rifle deals more damage over time than sniper rifle. You still need to put at least 2 people on the other side with handgrenades/shotguns because you're unlikely to kill them in time.

Also, twisty corridors with trained war bears. These force fights to be 1 on 1, and few combatants can beat a bear.

[Hans Lemurson]

For a non-tribal start, it's not hard to lure sappers into a killbox.  Put all your turrets somewhere else.  Wait for sappers to show up and decide to path through the (apparently safe) killbox.  Then plant your turrets there.  Laugh as killing commences.

I'm going to repost this in the "exploits" thread since it seems too easy.  Sappers should rethink where they're attacking when turrets show up.

[giannikampa]

I play turretless, sappers look like all the other enemies, didn't even know they avoid turret's LineOfSight now.

Must say I had to tone down by one the level of difficulty from A16, i find the game too hard for now

[Shurp]

That's an option I've considered too.  It's harder to game the AI now, but you can win in a stand-up fight if you tone down the opposition strength. 

But you can *also* win by dumping turrets everywhere, which creates an entertaining economic challenge!

BTW, I've discovered sappers do sometimes seem to pay attention to turret locations in the targeting phase.  You may have to wait until they start attacking the wall before dropping your turrets, otherwise they find somewhere else to attack.  But once they've committed they'll blunder right into the nest.

[TheMeInTeam]

I'm going to repost this in the "exploits" thread since it seems too easy.  Sappers should rethink where they're attacking when turrets show up.

I'm not sure it's worth doing.  Since turrets and batteries are movable, even 5 colonists could rotate 10 turrets to any breach you want to contest before a grenade sapper could break through 2 layers of stone wall.  In practice you'd probably rotate fewer and just shoot into the breach from behind them.

That's not even close to the most resource-efficient way to stop sappers either, considering you can use unpowered turrets to steer them deliberately or even just external structures + micromanagement to harass them and turn them into a normal raid w/o taking return fire.

[SubZeroBricks]

Its alpha 16 but I don't imagine much has changed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gXFVTjaBzOk

Also I'd recommend this guy's other videos he's pretty decent ngl.