Closed vs. Open Colonies

[BasileusMaximos]

A closed colony is where he entire colony is contained within a wall of some sort and might even be one continuous building.

An open colony is where the settlement is a collection of buildings not completely contained within a wall or single structure.

Which colony type do you prefer? I know that a closed colony is probably better from a gameplay perspective but I like making western styled towns with the single main road with small outlying farmsteads. Looks nice and pastoral.

When I get advanced enough however I try to make a high-tech complex that is closed off. 

[TheMeInTeam]

Closed makes the micromanagement to handle large manhunter packs so much less awful.  Otherwise you're opening a door, shooting then shut/repair over and over and over again, often with the obligatory forced speed 1.

I actually grade perimeter wall + doors out as the strongest individual defensive setup in the game.  It is more cost efficient than killboxes and can mimic the outcome with good micromanagement, requires no technology, allows inferior weapons (even just clubs) to handle most early raid types, and makes defeat in detail a lot less problematic to set up.

Fighting 1000's or even 10000+ of animal hp one at a time from buildings is not good times though.

[Nameless]

Closed, easy to manage, no need to spread defense out thin.

[PhantomFav]

Open colonies are more efficient if you are in montuose maps. Within a valley surrounded by rocks and with few well fortified access points, the Open colonies is valuable as a closed one. The only major problem is the toxic fallout!

But i prefer another type of colony: the reversed one. This is still a type of closed colony, but with the farming area surrounded by your colonist apartments, the recreation and the production rooms and the various warehouses. It's better if the central cultivated area is the rich soil (140% fertility). With the toxic fallout and the approach of the winter, I need only to build the roof up this area, and use the solar lamps for a beautiful new greenhouse!
I have stolen this model from the typical imperial roman house


And if the central cultivated area is still insufficient for your colony, you can still farm the external terrains like a classic closed colony

[ColonistGirl]

Even when I have separate buildings, I tend to have a perimeter wall set up to avoid enemies being able to just walk up to the colony from any direction. Had one really cool colony that was set on a coast, and there were two spurs of rock that stuck out into deep water, that let me create a nice big wall around the colony that protected it from every direction, and forced invaders to come at it only from one way.

[crazyroosterman]

I like to role play in scenarios so I generally don't do it unless it fits the scenario in question.

[The Nickman]

I always like to start with an open colony, I prefer to keep my "houses" separate and have different buildings for storing wood, textiles, weapons etc as my colony grows, but I eventually end up walling off all of the passes approaching and adding doors/sandbags so in effect I end up with a closed colony.

I just find defending an open colony on Extreme difficulty to be near-on impossible.

[Albion]

I too prefer closed colonies simply because I don't see much benefit in splitting into different houses. There is basically no upside to having pawns walk beneath the sky and since they usually do that anyway for joy or to hunt/plant, I never have trouble with cabin fever.
The major upside of closed colonies is also the protection from toxic fallout and the possibility to heat/cool the hallways between bedrooms. I usually only heat/cool the common areas which are connected to the hallways between the bedrooms and doing so usually results in comfortable temperatures in the bedrooms. Extreme weather conditions however or things like a cold snap or heat wave still require additional cooling/heating though.
However I still occasionally have something like an outhouse for long-term storage of things like art, clothing or weapons to sell off to traders. Also I ferment my beer in a separate location and have walled off geothermal generators.
Regarding the perimeter wall:
It definitely has its upsides but since I usually don't play on extreme difficulty I don't invest the high cost in stone bricks and just have a firewall in every direction raiders could be coming from.

[Sbilko]

A closed colony is where...

I'd like to see a picture of your colony, because I myself like and make little town-like colonies.

[levi12373]

I personally mostly make a small perimeter wall with basic needs (fridge houses etc) and add things like gardens outside the walls, only to enclose them later in the game by expanding my walls

[Klitri]

Using mods I've recently built a huge huge base of Plasteel and the only way in and out of it is through advanced drop pods in the hanger bay of the base. It's sealed through three layers of plasteel wall and has no access in and out... Pretty cool. It's like a little cloud of glitterworld heaven on an otherwise barren planet.

[Mutineer]

I do not use turrets at all and prefer mobile defence of colonists + animals. So, generally, my colony is a gradual expansion of outside walls.
Having wall give you time to draft your colonists and collect them for defence, animals to join draftees. So when raid tries to break outside wall I am preparing and deciding how to engage them. It is especially useful if you playing on the small maps when raids spam right next to your base. Later as colony expand previous walls become part of rooms, storage, farm....

[Mkok]

I like digging into a mountain from some valley, I ussually wall in all the entrances to the valley, and then build half closed/half open colony inside the valley.

But I always leave every original entrance passable, no killboxes or anything. Kinda like medieval cities. City, with city walls surounding it, and a fortified castle in middle 

[cyberian]

I like a castle design:

with the extensions being filled with weapons and turrets and such and having overlapping fire.
I know its way less efficient than a big wall with only one direction where attackers come from but I like it this way and it fits with Medieval Times mod I am using I got many Ballista and Catapults in the towers

[Hessra]

Open, I like building aesthetic little towns. It's not efficient or easy to defend at all but it looks nice and cozy. Unless everything is on fire. Slightly less cozy.