When I start a caravan usually bad events happen

[doctercorgi]

like disease or physic drones, its like randy doesn't want me to leave. does anyone else have this happen?

[ProjectXa3]

I can't say I do, but I stick to Phoebe on base-builder difficulty, so there might be some translation loss.

[BetaSpectre]

Makes sense for raiders to raid you when your defenses are down.

[eadras]

I want to complete one of those map missions, but I haven't managed to yet.  Either something happens to stop me from sending them out, or upon arrival, I find that the force I sent is insufficient to pacify the objective.  Some of those objectives have 6-8 turrets, incendiary mortars, and several heavily armed guards.  If I send enough of my best fighters to have a chance at taking it, there is invariably a massive mech or sapper raid at my base.  Been playing Randy and Cass at Intense level in A17.

[Blastoderm]

I find caravans rarely worth the effort. If I need steel then I request bulk trader caravan because I can always make silver to compensate. All the troubles with bad events ambushes, insanely huge food demand - nope.

[quilzas]

I rarely find I'm in a position to get a caravan for a stash or a request up and going, or that the reward is worth it. I did one last night on a lark - the stash was close enough. Got there, things went super smooth. Headed home and got hit first by a manhunter pack - two lynxes, no big deal. Continued on, and then my poor little caravan was ambushed by raiders.  Happily the raiders had to funnel through a big pack of boomalopes to get to me.  Shot a couple of those critters and fiery chaos ensued.  That made that fight.. possible.  I did eventually make it home without loosing anyone.   Considering how much food I needed on that little trip.. I'm not sure I came out ahead, profit-wise. 

[ProjectXa3]

Been playing Randy and Cass at Intense level in A17.

Well there's your problem right there, isn't it! Can't get anything done with those two at that level besides holding your own and staying alive.

[DaviBones]

I always try to send caravans immediately after raids, so as to minimize the number of raids my main colony gets. I try to split my best fighters evenly between the caravan and main base, with a good doctor for each group. Much easier once you have at least 8 colonists and good quality firearms.

Always bring a sniper rifle when you might encounter turrets. They can snipe the solar panels and/or batteries from out of range.

EDIT: I play on Cassandra Intense, and send out caravans all the damn time, even when I have as few as 5 colonists if I'm feeling ballsy/lucky. It is possible, you just need to have the right strategy.

[Panzer]

I dont know about cass, but randy has been fairly nice to me and my caravans. I never had an ambush that I couldnt beat (randy intense), in fact the ambushes were rather easy, like a single fox or 2 pirates max. Then again, I dont send out giant caravans, the things I buy are usually not heavy, bionics, drugs, neutroamine dont weigh much, medicine and components is the heaviest thing I buy.

My caravans are usually comprised of 1-2 people, and maybe a prisoner or two if I want to sell a lot, including the prisoners. Clutter in the stockpiles usually has to wait til I get deep drilling and scanner, then I can drill for chemfuel and steel, and go crazy with drop pods. Caravan ambushes are sometimes even wanted, because I get to spend some time at the ambush site and can maybe mine some resources, components are always good to mine, if I get lucky maybe some rare resources like jade or gold.

Drop pods have new features by the way, you can visit a base via drop pod (formerly only attack) and launch resources onto a tile with a caravan, the resources will be added to their wares. Pods are also nice to have when you get a bad ambush to launch support to the battlefield.