Unstable build feedback thread

[Copperwire]

So... the AI Core quest this time was guarded by 12 manhunting rats.  There was a nearby peace talk, a 4 enemy outpost, and two friendly villages, so I decided to do them in a big circle, so I sent 3 pawns and 5 muffalo plus a bunch of trade junk. 

I did the rats ... more like the Muffalo did 10 rats and we shot 2 and patched 1 Muffalo cause she got an owie.  Usually, I don't mess with dead animals on convoy, but we were 2 hexes down a road from a village and basically empty, having hit one village already .... so I decided to butcher, because ... why not.

In for a penny .... so I did the berries/healroot on the map, made a horseshoe pin for the guy getting rec loopy, sheared the muffalo, and shot all the bigger wildlife etc.   Net, 2.4k silver in about 6 game hours.  Traded that for 2 Doomsday cause Meat > Doomsday Rockets. 

1.  If animal corpses had slightly lower value and slightly longer spoil time then butchered meat/leather it would both make hunting trips/caravan interactions more realistic/rewarding and do something about the 24 muffalo in the freezer is zero wealth factor.  There are still times you might want to butcher, to drop the weight or save space (much like real life).  I think doing this while dropping the value of food across the board (whats worth more, an autopistol or a bail (200) of hay? trick question: you can't sell hay, which do you want to steal? do you have a tractor to take the 20 bails of hay with you? are you afraid of my hay so you brought more bros?) would smooth out the game a bit and firm up the setting.

2.  The outpost I did before this came to net ~500 silver and 4 components - because most of what they had were weapons (which seem to have a "sin" tax ...).  I took and sold the lamps etc (use all parts of the .... Muffalo victims, especially the ones that aren't "sin" taxed).  The reward (a plasteel table and a jade chair) will sell for maybe 500 silver.  The relative value seems off.  If looting a random hex + 12 rats gives twice the relative value of a quest reward and a looted outpost, why would anyone bother?

3.  I am pretty sure I could have bought the two Doomsday, left, pressed attack, and leveled the town.  I think 1.2k is a bit low for a "blow up your town" rocket and I am not sure a neutral village should trust me that much

[alxddd]

I see that you've returned to the original component / advanced component models! Personally I'm really happy about that.  Speaking of, after playing the game a bit with the new meat models, something just feels off about them still.  I honestly think they should return to their original design and colors.. Don't fix what isn't broken right?

I strongly disagree, the overall direction of the art changes are great: Stronger colors, much clearer what that stuff is supposed to be. The old components are not as good, the new ones were my favorite art change so far. Although the meat is not as great as the components, it goes in the same direction, only the color is not as strong.

I agree with this guy on the new art direction. Extremely disappointed to see the devs change it back. Loved the new components, silver and meat. #bringbackredcubes

[Crow_T]

ah dang, never got to see the new components... If we are talking reverting textures I'd love to see the old wood floors back, the new ones are dull-colored. Previously they were nice and warm, the base looked pretty at night

[Toast]

Storyteller: Cass crashlanded
Difficulty: Rough
Biome/hilliness: Flat tundra
Commitment mode: nope
Current colony age (days): 90-ish
Hours played in the last 2 days: 12-ish, all before today's updates
Complete mod list: mod-free for unstable


Year 2 arrives. It seems like most of the reports here are from people with large colonies, but I haven't had much luck getting new pawns to recruit who aren't saddled with awful traits (I do not accept pyros or druggies or food hogs). The acceptable raiders either die or have multiple important bits shot off. With only 4 pawns so far, every new person needs to contribute something real to make up for the spike in wealth and food needs they would bring. But 4 people isn't enough to keep things running in the short, hectic growing season. I only have 20 days to grow all the food for the year AND complete caravans before it snows AND defend against the raiders who love the warm weather.

While my 2 growers are running around planting, I get a request for 31 cowboy hats from a settlement 2 days to the south. I actually have the crafter and the cotton to get it done, but it's a gamble to send a caravan anywhere with so few people. I decide to risk it because I have nothing to trade otherwise--I love making drug farms in year-round growing biomes but this is obviously harder on the frozen tundra. So Blackjack the crafter spits out 31 hats in record time (feels like crafting clothing goes faster now, maybe I'm imagining it?) and I send him off to trade. We get an archotech arm which is cool but less appealing than more components, a shield belt, and the healthy slave with no gross traits for sale. So we're finally up to 5 pawns.

Unfortunately the new pawn joins at the same time the massive fields of food are ready to harvest and I failed to properly anticipate the resulting wealth spike. We go from raids of 4-5 nerds with pea shooters to raids of 9 people with grenades and fire weapons, and we have no killbox and only half an outer wall. The new pawn has some melee skill so I spend an Inspiration making him a Masterwork suit of steel armor to go with the shield belt I bought with him, and I decide to bite the bullet and use our steel on traps. It is... somewhat effective. I place them on the corners of buildings where raiders will seek cover. So 1-2 raiders each time are removed from combat at the cost of 35 steel each, and the rest are dealt with by shooting from doorways and having Partridge the Unshootable Metal Colossus attract gunfire, ambush grenadiers around corners, and bar the way to melee attackers. He's gotten set on fire more than either of us would like but otherwise we've managed to keep the colony from serious harm, even after jerks drop-podded directly into our bedrooms. Best 31 cowboy hats I ever spent.

Thoughts:

* The new trap situation is still way harsh on resource-scarce maps. It does help some that they now cost 35 stuff and you get 40 steel from a square now. But I'd much rather spend that precious steel on other things--but there's no wood to waste on the tundra and crafting stone traps takes way too long, I discovered, especially in a colony with little manpower. They absolutely work, every single raider who steps on one is killed or downed reliably, and that is good. Unfortunately they are just as likely to work on something dumb, like the 6 manhunter hares who ended up costing me 100+ steel. Why, Bigwig, why?? I think this is a move that punishes small and less established colonies and those in harsher biomes. I say that as someone who never used "trap mazes" or dedicated trap corridors but simply found them an effective way to thin the herd in a killbox and also to foil sappers.

* Melee combat feels good now. The skill rises much faster than I remember and the new additions like kicking dirt in someone's eyes give it flavor. The new plate armor gives good protection from the sudden limb losses or heart-stabbing deaths that I remember from early melee combat in previous games. Partridge only has 8 skill and no Brawler or Nimble but he's still the MVP in raids right now with my no-killbox setup.

* The raids that drop pod into the middle of your base have never happened so early for me before. I managed to hold this one off with only the loss of a bed with rad artwork (sad) but now I have to consider whether I want my pawns wearing some degree of armor at all times because they can't throw it on quickly like they used to. It's a tricky decision in a climate that is dangerously cold for much of the year. Parkas keeps us safer than flak jackets on 9/10 days and are less uggo on 10/10. I'm fine with this being a strategic choice now, but may I humbly request that if constant armor is going to be a possible necessity, we get the option to turn it off visually in the colonist bar, like the toggle for hats? Keep Rimworld beautiful, hide the fugly flak.

* I had an arctic fox and a snowhare self-tame and both eventually reverted to the wild because I had no one to do taming maintenance on them. Being desperate for trade, I took them to two colonies trying to sell them, neither would buy them, nor would any of the multiple bulk goods and exotic goods caravans and orbital traders who visited in the forty-one days it takes for a fox to go wild. Does anyone at all buy these animals now?

* I am another player who uses flagstone to make outdoor walkways and I also would like it to cost less. I think 2 stone per square is quite reasonable for a path with no beauty that takes stonecutting labor to create and from which you will get no resources back. I was using a mod to make it cost 2 per before I removed mods for the unstable version.

* Re: new traits, Undergrounder doesn't really seem to... do anything. Maybe it's because I don't play mountain bases, but back when I did I remember it pretty much being a non-issue to take a Cabin Fever pawn outside for 10 seconds, problem solved. It is implemented very "flavorfully" by being linked to the backgrounds about mining and living underground, which I like a lot, but the gameplay impact seems to be nil. I also wonder why my Undergrounder pawn is so whiny about darkness, shouldn't she be used to dark places if she grew up in a cave? Regarding pawns who love/hate artificial body parts, I am still very confused about exactly what types of replacement body parts (regular prosthetic-->bionics-->archotech) will affect which types of pawns. Bionics used to be neutral for pawns without traits, but then you added I Never Asked For This, but then removed it? Regular prosthetics are considered "enhanced body parts" by Transhumanists even though they suck worse than flesh? Help, I am so confused. Right now I'm completely avoiding Body Purist pawns because the wording on the trait is so vague that I don't know if, like, saving their life with a regular prosthetic heart will upset them. If that's the case, it might just be the worst trait in the entire game.


https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/994618563527424639/D598B521987F0400745A160C961B37A35AC7B874/

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/994618563527424078/9EB1DC53448454877CE7355F85FE52B0E2BCBB6C/

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/994618563527424393/62B552D9FC4EEA15FF8A8C2853333EFFC4544F9D/

[weatherdown]

Storyteller: Cassandra
Difficulty: Medium
Biome/hilliness: Temperate forest, Mountainous
Commitment mode: no
Current colony age (days): 16
Hours played in the last 2 days: 15+
Complete mod list: none

Crash landed with 3 guys/gals, put the given flak armor on the best shooter along with a bolt action rifle. The other 2 were about even so one go the pistol and the other the knife (all starting items). On day 16 I got a raid. 1 naked chic with a knife. (had the Tough bonus). She proceeded to annihilate my camp and kill all my chickens until "The Man in Black" showed up and even HE barely managed to put her down.. 

Something seems a bit off for this to happen on Medium difficulty. Likewise a chinchilla (angry or not) shouldn't be able to take down someone in full flak (that happened on like day 2).

[Jstank]

Just a very minor visual suggestion. When you do select merciless mode, the colors don't look like you actually selected anything. I could see this being a red-green color blind issue.

[Mordenak]

Was chemfuel removed as a deep drill resource?  I searched through the thread and didn't see anything saying such (could have missed it), but I just got deep-drilling and noticed that my map has red-patches, which are all chemfuel, and when drilled only give 1 chemfuel per portion.  I've had this colony since build 1975.  So has something changed in between those that I missed?  Vanilla, no mods - new colonies do not have chemfuel pockets anywhere, using devmode to check.

[Sirinox]

Storyteller: Cassandra
Difficulty: Savage
Scenario: Tribal start
Biome/hilliness: Tundra, flat, river
Commitment mode: no
Current colony age (days): 395
Hours played in the last 2 days: 12+
Complete mod list: No Forced Slowdown, Progress Renderer

Made a tribal colony to test current research points for tribals. Feels pretty balanced, it sure took longer to progress through research tree, but not too much.

Some observations and suggestion from this colony:
* When assigning pawn a weapon it's crucial to know their accuracy (not just shooting). It'd be useful if there was a way to see current accuracy (including effects of scars, lost eyes, bad backs, traits and so on) easier, maybe in the tooltip when mouse over the shooting skill. Though temporary illness might interfere with it.
* Transhumanists happy from peg legs doesn't feel right.
* It's cool that now we have a button to copy bills, but it would be nice to also have a button to copy-paste all bills from a workbench, like storage settings. Most of the time when I copy bills from one bench to another I need to copy all of them, not one. Buttons are also pretty small, so maybe a hotkey would be useful, again like for storage settings.
* When I select some pawns and command them to attack, all melee pawns rush to the target while I just want my gunners to shoot. If there was a separate button for "only ranged attack" like there is for melee attack It'd be nice.
* Mining drill better be signed as unpowered when empty. Otherwise I need one more click to reinstall them and, if I'm not mistaken, they continue to drain power for nothing.
* While trading or loading caravan/transport pod it's easy to misclick item you want, It'd be better if the whole row was highlighted while mouse is over it, not just a segment of it.
* When you have big livestock it's hard to check everyone's health (say, I want to maintain some number of muffalos for caravans and need to see if some have lost legs and need replacement). A way to cycle through them like it is with colonists, or maybe extra info bar in "Animal" tab would do.
* Caravans are so much more convenient! <3
I found threats are quite balanced and progression with wealth was not as terrifying for now as I though it would be.
But I found that there is no way to depart from a site partly or make a few trips to and from, only to abandon it completely, yet sometimes I'd like to send only part of my caravan back or to get second caravan in and then return it. Once I had more stuff on my caravan than it could haul (few consecutive successful mining trips) and tried to get the stuff to another site with splitting caravan and making two trips, but there was no way to depart from the mining site when I got there other than abandon it.

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[drunetovich]

How do you enable merciless now? I refuse to play on anything less difficult.

The button's at the bottom of the storyteller select screen in the middle.

I'm curious why you refuse to ever try a lower difficulty? This is something I've observed in various forms and it's worth understanding the motivation.

In my case it is vanity, pure and simple. Attaining success on the max possible difficulty in the game give a feeling of superiority that is rarely obtainable in the real world due to abundant competition. Even eventually failing give this feeling as well, because you courageously made an attempt against seemingly impossible odds, going down in valiant struggle, feeling like a hero.
Lowering difficulty on the other hand seem like giving up, admitting being weak, picking an easy and cheap way out, same as when you cheating. Unbearable feeling of sadness, like you are not good enough, not even for beating a game.

[bbqftw]

I don't think chemfuel deep drilling is supposed to produce 1 chemfuel per cycle

[santafefoundation]

Man I really liked the new component look, now we're back to the turtle components    

While im here, for the longest time I thought the 'Cut Plants' icon was a green rubber glove over a knife hahah.


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[dogthinker]

Storyteller: Randy
Difficulty: Merciless
Biome/hilliness: Temperate, flat
Commitment mode: yes
Current colony age (days): 141
Hours played in the last 2 days: ~20
Complete mod list: none

My colony is right up against one of the map edges. I can't recall the last time I've ever had a raid spawn immediately adjacent to the base (I actually assumed it's coded to spawn map edge raids some minimum distance away), but I just had a refugee raid spawn right on top of it (see screenshot to see what I mean, you can see the map edge in the picture). Bug? Maybe it happened because it was a chase event rather than a regular raid?

34 raiders isn't too much of a threat to this colony normally... But when the fleeing nurse appeared right next to the colony I knew things might go a bit awry. It was a real rush to get some walls/sandbags thrown up before the raid appeared, but there wasn't time to equip the colonists properly for battle... But Tomomi had a doomsday launcher, and she finally had a good enough reason to use it... 15 raiders killed in one shot. Yikes.

I guess I'd better build a wall on that side of the base, to slow them down a little if it happens again.

Aside, I think the newer meat textures are good now. I really liked the new component textures, before they got reverted.

The colony has finally teched up to drop pods. My first observation is that, unlike caravans, there's no way to modify the load without cancelling and starting again (in particular, I'd like to be able to load goods into the drop pod like normal... but be able to later add the colonist (e.g. right click 'get in drop pod'))

EDIT: oh, and another thing... I tried using Drug Policies for the first time. I liked the idea of having my soldiers carry around go-juice and my doctors wake-up, so I set up some policies that had 'take to inventory' set to 1, but 'only if recreation below' set to 1%, so they wouldn't actually use the drugs... Just have them to hand in case of emergencies. However, they never even pick up the drugs. :/

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[Syrchalis]

My colony is right up against one of the map edges. I can't recall the last time I've ever had a raid spawn immediately adjacent to the base (I actually assumed it's coded to spawn map edge raids some minimum distance away), but I just had a refugee raid spawn right on top of it (see screenshot to see what I mean, you can see the map edge in the picture). Bug? Maybe it happened because it was a chase event rather than a regular raid?

I don't think it's coded like that. You would be able to control where raids spawn with a few walls or random items placed strategically.

In other words: Never build at the map edge, except on mountain maps (the mountainous side) or coastal tiles (the sea side).

[mlzovozlm]

My colony is right up against one of the map edges. I can't recall the last time I've ever had a raid spawn immediately adjacent to the base (I actually assumed it's coded to spawn map edge raids some minimum distance away), but I just had a refugee raid spawn right on top of it (see screenshot to see what I mean, you can see the map edge in the picture). Bug? Maybe it happened because it was a chase event rather than a regular raid?

I don't think it's coded like that. You would be able to control where raids spawn with a few walls or random items placed strategically.

In other words: Never build at the map edge, except on mountain maps (the mountainous side) or coastal tiles (the sea side).

though if it's cave-featured mountainous map, you may get a big chunk of empty land right behind your back if not checked with dev mode, happened to me once :|

also, does raiders and whatnot come from inside the mountain if i dig until the every edge tile (basically "open" the mountain from inside)?

[dogthinker]

I don't think it's coded like that. You would be able to control where raids spawn with a few walls or random items placed strategically.

In other words: Never build at the map edge, except on mountain maps (the mountainous side) or coastal tiles (the sea side).

Ah, you know, I think I used to do that, but since rivers and roads came in I prioritise those, as they make the map a bit more interesting. I also played on much larger maps (but the tooltip for those now suggests the game doesn't quite work right on those)... So maybe I'm just noticing it more now.

There's not really room for an exploit, there are quite trivial algorithms that could decide which point of the map edge the colony is closest to, overall. Which IMO would be a good idea, given the recommended map sizes are pretty tight.

I'll probably still build near the edge regardless. I'd rather have no notice some of the time, than have not enough notice all the time. The time it takes for a raid to walk across the map is barely enough time for the colonists pull on some armour and get positioned before the raid hits, really.