Modularity or Orginality

[Praetorian]

Sometimes I'll make a large "complex" underground, with 3-space wide hallways (2-space in the bedroom areas) so that if an infestation happens, I've got nice, long killways that the bugs have to travel down and my colonists can set up to shoot.

Funny you should say that as my current setup pictured above (featuring Rimatomics) is built so that within about a minutes notice the hallways can be raised to 200 degrees Celsius for rapidly cooking infestations (whilst leaving hives intact). It's a setup that has saved my base more that once.

[TheMeInTeam]

Like most people, i build organically with strict design guidelines.

probably my quirkiest thing is that i tend to to skip automated killboxes and use manned kill corridors...I wall my entire base except for one side, set up a nice 8-wide hallway or so, put a door, wall, door on each side, and then shrink it to 6 wide, door wall, door, 4 wide, door wall door, open it back up to 6 wide briefly but put some wall sections to simulate a 2-wide...repeated twice.

This gives me 16 engaged pawns all at once, in cover behind walls (and usually a sandbag)....it means they never shoot each other (like they would in a 3-wide all-the-way-down hallway with door combat)

Corridor is significantly more efficient than trying a turret box IMO.  I'm not picturing exactly what yours looks like.  It's effectively a funnel to a choke entry point with a wall design that lets everyone shoot into the funnel right?

8 pawns can safely shoot down a 2x2 corridor with two sets of double doors.  (3x3 non-friendly fire rule), but widening this sounds attractive.  8 LMG is a little light on sustained DPS to shred stuff, but 12+ could cycle fire a constant stream of bullets and against clusters of meat should break 100 DPS easily.  If fired at a grave or marriage spot or something they're poor man's miniguns and even a random shoddy LMG with 24% health can seriously contribute.

[Vlad0mi3r]

I like to build things organically which I suppose equals originality for this thread. Look at the map features and work out some basics then go from there. I also like to work on aesthetics, Yes a 3 wide solid stone corridor is a good defensive structure but I think it would send you batty living around it all the time. How about an open area with nice paving and the good old horse shoe pin. Think about if you were living in this settlement what would help you de-stress and forget about those raiders for a moment.

This method can also lead to interesting issue to resolve as well. For example, I have this little spot here that will work for a couple of telescopes but its hard up next to the geothermal generator. How many statues is it going to take to make this spot pleasant to be in?

[Kori]

It's a nice little hidden valley in the mountains with only one way in, a big open area with lots of crop fields, and the colony dug into the mountainside.

That makes me want to start a new colony in such a place!
Don't forget the screenshot!

[freemapa]

I definitely go for originality in my base design. I guess I tend to like to RP the game a bit more than most people.

We all know the pawns are a bit dense and constantly make stupid decisions. I like to embrace this. I pretend that this really is their first time attempting to build a base on a foreign planet. Building a section of the base, only to realize later that it's way too small for all my new population size is something that I think would actually happen, and I enjoy putting them all to work solving these new problems.

It's true that building a modular base can give you access to those higher difficulty levels, but I'd rather ease up on my pawns and give them the freedom to be their own bumbling selves.

[ColonistGirl]

It's a nice little hidden valley in the mountains with only one way in, a big open area with lots of crop fields, and the colony dug into the mountainside.

That makes me want to start a new colony in such a place!
Don't forget the screenshot!

I got REALLY lucky with the valley I ended up in. Not only is it locked away and nicely secure, but there were FOUR geothermal vents in the valley (and another one right beyond a narrow section of mountain, so I could easily tie it into the grid). So the moment we got to geothermal power our power problems were over forever.

Here's the base: https://imgur.com/a/bdKh5
And here's a longer shot of the valley: https://imgur.com/tWNSQYl

One thing I've also been trying lately to be more organized is to use storage cabinets to hold resources, food, etc, rather than just a collection zone. I use the StackXXL mod (and a bunch of others) so I can stack things larger than normal, as it made no sense to be able to only stack food 10 high, steel 75 high, etc, considering how large each of those spaces is supposed to be. Mostly because I was tired of the pawns stacking items haphazardly all over the place. A large storage area might have 3, 4, 5, or more stacks of a single item, even if the stacks weren't full, and it bothered me. A cabinet forces them all to be in one spot (well, two) due to the priority of the cabinet. And I can set one to critical, one to important, one to preferred, and one to normal, so they'll always stack things in descending order, making it easy to see at a glance how much I have, without having to have the huge expanded resource list on the left.

[Perq]

If I'm to be honest I'd say your base looks dull as all hell. :V It reminds me of prison, really. I prefer base that evolves with time, according to needs over master design. I have my design principles, sure, but I don't plan everything ahead.

Maybe it is my personal bias because I live in Europe in which towns are built way more organically and therefore I'm more used to this way of building.

[Seeker89]

It depends on the events. I start with a big room, getting everything set up. Then I move on with a nice 6 room bedroom box... and then go nuts making whatever I need at the time in a mess of rooms.

[ColonistGirl]

It depends on the events. I start with a big room, getting everything set up. Then I move on with a nice 6 room bedroom box... and then go nuts making whatever I need at the time in a mess of rooms.

My usual style is to get the kitchen/dining area set up and arranged first, and just set up beds in there early on. Everyone can sleep next to the food prep, so they can just roll out of bed, get something to eat, and get to work.

Next typically comes the bedrooms, then the med lab (because they're starting to get noticed by raiders and such), and finally a construction building with the crafting tools. Early on I generally only have a stone block cutting table and a research bench, since that's all I need to get through the first couple quadrums, while the colonists are hollowing out the hillsides to make rooms in.

[Kori]

I got REALLY lucky with the valley I ended up in. Not only is it locked away and nicely secure, but there were FOUR geothermal vents in the valley (and another one right beyond a narrow section of mountain, so I could easily tie it into the grid). So the moment we got to geothermal power our power problems were over forever.

Here's the base: https://imgur.com/a/bdKh5
And here's a longer shot of the valley: https://imgur.com/tWNSQYl

This valley is just perfect! You made good use of it with your base!
I also can't live without extended storage anymore and edited the cloth racks so they can be used for weapons as well. It makes such a difference and looks so much better when 70% of your base won't consist of huge stockpile zones anymore.
What are those wall lights you are using? I was looking for something like that.

[ColonistGirl]

I got REALLY lucky with the valley I ended up in. Not only is it locked away and nicely secure, but there were FOUR geothermal vents in the valley (and another one right beyond a narrow section of mountain, so I could easily tie it into the grid). So the moment we got to geothermal power our power problems were over forever.

Here's the base: https://imgur.com/a/bdKh5
And here's a longer shot of the valley: https://imgur.com/tWNSQYl

This valley is just perfect! You made good use of it with your base!
I also can't live without extended storage anymore and edited the cloth racks so they can be used for weapons as well. It makes such a difference and looks so much better when 70% of your base won't consist of huge stockpile zones anymore.
What are those wall lights you are using? I was looking for something like that.

Yeah, I was totally jazzed when I found it. "Ooh, there's two vents. Wait, three! FOUR! Oh my god!"

Extended storage is such a huge boon. I remember back before I found it, my freezers would be like 10x10 so they could store everything (I tend to make big crop fields, so I have TONS of food, both to sell and earn some silver as well as to ride out cold snaps, long winters, etc). Now I can get away with a little 6x6 freezer and have 3-4 racks for meals, holding a couple hundred. Plus the "Fridge" mod that allows for refridgerators, so I set them up out in the dining area, so the freezer becomes more of "long term storage".

The wall lights I think are a mod just called "wall lights", but I don't remember. I'll have to look it up when I get home from work. They're really handy, though. Not very bright, as they only illuminate out to about 3-4 squares from where they are, but 4 of them make a 5x7 room nicely lit, and they only require 5 steel to build, and cost 15 power. Some of my larger bases have 100+ of them.

[Kori]

Yeah, I was totally jazzed when I found it. "Ooh, there's two vents. Wait, three! FOUR! Oh my god!"

Extended storage is such a huge boon. I remember back before I found it, my freezers would be like 10x10 so they could store everything (I tend to make big crop fields, so I have TONS of food, both to sell and earn some silver as well as to ride out cold snaps, long winters, etc). Now I can get away with a little 6x6 freezer and have 3-4 racks for meals, holding a couple hundred. Plus the "Fridge" mod that allows for refridgerators, so I set them up out in the dining area, so the freezer becomes more of "long term storage".

The wall lights I think are a mod just called "wall lights", but I don't remember. I'll have to look it up when I get home from work. They're really handy, though. Not very bright, as they only illuminate out to about 3-4 squares from where they are, but 4 of them make a 5x7 room nicely lit, and they only require 5 steel to build, and cost 15 power. Some of my larger bases have 100+ of them.

Same here, I always have so many crop fields that in the past I had to store it unrefrigerated. In the end 50% of my micromanagement was sorting out which bag of rice/ corn/ potatoes is going to rot soon so that I better process it next.
With Extended Storage all those immense masses of food are neatly frozen now and I could survive a 10 years long winter if I have to (in my last game I had about 70.000 milk and even I got the feeling that it's slowly getting a bit too much...).

It's really funny how many people tend to hoard everything in computer games with this "maybe I'll need this later" mentality.

Let me know when you found out which wall lights mod it is, there seem to be a few out there but none of them updated for A17 as far as I can see..

[SpaceDorf]

It's really funny how many people tend to hoard everything in computer games with this "maybe I'll need this later" mentality.

For me it is more the Loot Mentality.
I can still get a silver for that 2 half rotten potatoes ... and I need this for crafting.
Mending and Recycling Mods made this even worse for me 

[Yoshida Keiji]

I only play Lost Tribe and to launch the ship. Normally I'm flying out by the fifth year or a bit later than that. Because of this, while I'm the organized type, and don't stage a settlement, permanent style.

Mountain bases look ridiculous to me from what I have seen from others. Even in ice sheet I don't need mountain map. I never play flats, but not because of a defensive angle but because I don't want to lose the mining feature.

I only see one base, looks like the "friend's" base was removed. From the one that is visible, I would say to place the hospital closer to the entrance, so that those who need rescue have shorter pathing, although your floors are fine. For me it matters lot because I'm into 400 x 400 maps.

Things that look a patter in all my bases are:

* At start, I find an ancient room and fill up the empty segments.
* Then I go for a large food storage and build kitchen, dinning room and recreational room connected all adjacent. But I'm very careful with the blueprints, always use the Planning Grid feature so that all my rooms will be "enclosing" the power buildings like walling them. Because I don't play with killbox or narrow corridors. And there's a chance enemies may break my walls. So I secure the wind turbines and solar generators, at the center. But of course build bunkers outside my base so that the fights won't usually take place where the walls may breach.
* That first room of early days, usually ends up becoming my Hospital later on.
* After the eating areas are done, I move to crafting areas/production and research, the order depends on many things. But I pay a lot of attention on the floor and try to use the natural stone grounds as corridors so that if a fire starts, the buildings are safe from fast fire spree.
* The only times I end up building additional layers of walls (inner + outer x2 x3...) is if I'm with a large horde that I need to extend the base for more grass area.


I will never do those perfect simetrical box like bases, as I said early, because I ain't staying forever. Mostly because there's only one ending. I need alternative victories to change my mind in that aspect.

Once things are settled, I too like to floor like you do, but I place columns either at the center or a side of the corridors, so I can roof those heavy traffic paths to get rid of snow or planning ahead against Toxic Fallout. No matter how large my base can become, I don't have to worry about their health, except for when the AI pathing starts to get weird. As of now its very hard to play bases with "L" shapes or "U" shapes as pawns cannot distinguish "inside" from "outside" (unless zone restricted), and they may go the shorter path by going outside and get stupidly killed, when walking inside is safer...Tynan!

In Ice Sheet I will be starting very small and then expand progressively, all around geysers.

[JimmyAgnt007]

As much as I love mountains, Sea Ice is my 2nd fave.  My colony of cannibals, I start with 1 and only recruit those who also have the trait.  Even so, I like to keep things planned and organized.