1.0 changing the game too much?

[Lightzy]

Rimworld is a limited game because of its underlying design. It relies overly much on scripted, mostly randomized events instead of on organic interconnected systems creating problems that emerge from the simulation.

Fair enough. Which games would you point to that did this the best?

Hi Tynan, I don't know if it did better, but there was chaining events that would keep progressing and reappearing years after it started but with a long hiatus between them.

King of Dragon Pass

That's a beautiful example from a wonderful game, but it's not what I was talking about since it's all story-scripted rather than emerging from the simulation.

But I think it would have been really awesome an expansion to rimworld's storyteller design.
Which is to say, to have some event happen where you make certain choices, and these choices then being reflected in a 'follow up' event that happens after some time.

This still falls into the limitation of having to pre-script it all, but it does help the player's feeling of agency and affect!

[Wintersdark]

Anyone who says Rimworld is "a completely different game" when jumping from B18 to 1.0 should be disregarded flat out. The person has no idea what they're talking about.

The vast majority of changes in 1.0 are positive. Rimworld is going in a great direction. Will it be perfect? No. Will it be excellent? Yes. 96% of recent reviews on Steam are positive, too. That's unheard of.

Stay the course, Tynan.

When all is said and done, 1.0's changes vs. B18 are pretty damn minor, particularly if you want to compare changes in, say, 15 > 16 when the world map was added (forgive me if I'm a version off; my meaning should be clear).

1.0 has a lot of balance changes, but this is fine: they are not "make everything the same" balance changes, and be wary of people complaining about the specifics of balance changes as there's a lot happening in quick iteration - complaints a couple days ago are likely irrelevant now. 

Fundamental game changes, though?  No, this is still Rimworld.  It's still the same game it was in B18 - some refreshed graphics, some balance changes and a new watermill hardly make for a new game. 

Want to play super-hardcore-ultra-difficult-race-to-win-condition?  You still can.  Want to build the perfect killboxes?  You still can.  Want to play a gentler, base building game without killboxes?  You can do that too. 

People railing on about unstable builds is just ridiculous.  And definitely, anyone saying Rimworld 1.0 is "a totally different game" deserves to be disregarded out of hand.  That's just ludicrous.

[Syrchalis]

But this model is not necessarily ideal for a single player game. Usually in single player games, there is a dominant strategy  (or rather, many mini-strategies for different situations). And during the learning phase, you're learning that strategy. And during the mastery phase, you can try and challenge yourself by using less optimal strategies, or use the dominant strategy but give the AI more numbers, etc.

But I think this is exactly what's happening in reverse. The dominant strategy in B18 and before was boring and now the arising strategies are actually really fun to execute.

Of course this is my personal opinion, however I have the feeling that some others feel the same way. I especially like that kill box strategies aren't obsolete, just you can't have a single layer wall and an endless maze no mortal being can pass without dying - but you can still funnel enemies into chokepoints and abuse that, which is great. The better parts of the strategy persist and have their place.

[I Am Testing This Game]

But I think this is exactly what's happening in reverse. The dominant strategy in B18 and before was boring and now the arising strategies are actually really fun to execute.

That's certainly a reasonable position.

But from reading those threads, it seems that another portion of the player base LIKED trivializing significant portions of the game and found the game more enjoyable because they could do so.

Only time will tell how 1.0 is received, but I do see it as risky to make all these big changes, if your intent is to finish the game and be done with it, rather than having to do several more post release balance updates.

[zizard]

But I think this is exactly what's happening in reverse. The dominant strategy in B18 and before was boring and now the arising strategies are actually really fun to execute.

Of course this is my personal opinion, however I have the feeling that some others feel the same way. I especially like that kill box strategies aren't obsolete, just you can't have a single layer wall and an endless maze no mortal being can pass without dying - but you can still funnel enemies into chokepoints and abuse that, which is great. The better parts of the strategy persist and have their place.

If you try to look past the stated purpose of the changes, you'll find that only a few of them affect this, and mostly not significantly. Before this patch, trap spam was still practically the same as in B18. The only difference was the increase in sapper raids, which are more annoying than difficult, and the increase in absurdly tanky mech raids, which nerf all defence equally.

[Greep]

Well drop pods also happen pretty crazy frequently in the end game.  If you're willing to cheeze a bit you can stop 40% of those by putting a powered orbital beacon outside your trap entrance, though 

[zizard]

Ah yeah, but that nerfs "ethical" defences pretty badly too. And mech drops are so obnoxious I'm actually building mountain bases.

[Injured Muffalo]

I have been concerned about this. I feel that the idea to do these rapid fire beta builds is a way to get a lot of data, but it's playing with people's expectations. No one has any idea how long this "1.0 beta" phase will last and considering the extensive changes from week to week, it's hard to know if the game is going in a direction you enjoy or somehow being diluted in a giant committee.

I think Tynan is very responsive. TBH I have never had the experience of talking with a developer before and having an impact on a game. He doesn't know me; he has a lot of stuff to do. But he takes the time to see what people are thinking. I admire that even if I disagree with some choices he makes. We aren't going to all agree on everything.

I have various pet peeves and, yes, fears about things changed in the latest builds. I play so slowly that I haven't been involved in the combat things (I read all the updates, but I'm not a rapid fire colony player).

There are a lot of annoyances in B18, but it seems neat and balanced all the same. Just a little incomplete. If I were Tynan, I would have gone for a more incremental update style and perhaps not pushed the idea of 1.0 out there and done this, I must say, chaotic balancing phase. To players it's months of silence and then a new build. It might have been chaotic to the developers every day. Also, I gather that with all those years and revisions, there has been an incremental update style and they are just wanting to speed it up and put the official seal of completeness on it.

There are so many games out there that used an older, probably inferior publishing model which went roughly, developer estimates development time, publisher issues credit, development time is wrong/publisher needs liquidity/Disney is doing a movie and needs a release date for a tied in game, publisher cuts off development and game is released. The crowdfunding/open beta is all different, but yeah, it's not engaging to do one project for so long.

So, it feels chaotic, it feels like huge changes are being made at the last minute and people are getting invested in things that change suddenly, people don't know what to expect from the final release, I wondered if there would be any balancing after release, and it's kind of emotion inducing when you have an actual input. Tynan making a dramatic story out of the development of the story generator. 

It would be hugely disappointing if for whatever reason B18 ended up being more rewarding. People have a lot of positive things to say about 1.0 builds and I would like to weigh in, but I just haven't had time to build up a colony there. All I can do is theorycraft about new features, but I follow the rules.

Edit - maybe this is a stupid idea...but if you signal doneness with a, like a "any small last minute things you want in the game that haven't already been tweaked" type topic where you can briefly explain why this and that was never done, and add in that polish. Granted that topic would probably be a clusterfuck but who knows, it could be just the thing to give everyone something. I almost expect this to come about...

[EvadableMoxie]

While the goal is probably to make the fun strategies actually viable, I don't think the current design is reaching that goal.  The only way to survive on extreme is to use some type of cheese, be it aggressively reducing wealth to the point where you never develop, or other manners of cheese defenses.  It's just as punishing to actually try to fight with your pawns as it ever was, which seems to be what we should want.  But armor is weaker and RNG based, pawns still lose body parts left and right, and it's even more punishing to actually progress your colony into higher wealth levels.

Maybe it's different on lower difficulties but on higher ones the only thing the changes have done is force you to cheese even harder. I think the solution to this isn't to keep nerfing turrets and traps.  It's to buff actually fighting with your pawns so you aren't so aggressively punished for doing so.

[Tynan]

While the goal is probably to make the fun strategies actually viable, I don't think the current design is reaching that goal.  The only way to survive on extreme is to use some type of cheese, be it aggressively reducing wealth to the point where you never develop, or other manners of cheese defenses.  It's just as punishing to actually try to fight with your pawns as it ever was, which seems to be what we should want.  But armor is weaker and RNG based, pawns still lose body parts left and right, and it's even more punishing to actually progress your colony into higher wealth levels.

Maybe it's different on lower difficulties but on higher ones the only thing the changes have done is force you to cheese even harder. I think the solution to this isn't to keep nerfing turrets and traps.  It's to buff actually fighting with your pawns so you aren't so aggressively punished for doing so.

I'd be interested in hearing what strategies people are actually using in up-to-date high-difficulty 1.0 games (in up-to-date games from the last 2 days). I've only seen one report recently, someone on Phoebe Survival Struggle had a big symmetrical base with outer wall and inner turret lanes.

Turrets and traps are pretty buffed recently (based on feedback), I'm waiting to see how they play out as the conversation catches up to the reality of how the game actually plays.

I agree about "buff fighting with your pawns" - this is a major goal. But it's hard to say how to do that. I'm very open to suggestions here. There are challenges with this given that your pawns play by the same rules as enemy pawns; it's hard to say how to buff one side but not the other.

[Firestonezz]

While the goal is probably to make the fun strategies actually viable, I don't think the current design is reaching that goal.  The only way to survive on extreme is to use some type of cheese, be it aggressively reducing wealth to the point where you never develop, or other manners of cheese defenses.  It's just as punishing to actually try to fight with your pawns as it ever was, which seems to be what we should want.  But armor is weaker and RNG based, pawns still lose body parts left and right, and it's even more punishing to actually progress your colony into higher wealth levels.

Maybe it's different on lower difficulties but on higher ones the only thing the changes have done is force you to cheese even harder. I think the solution to this isn't to keep nerfing turrets and traps.  It's to buff actually fighting with your pawns so you aren't so aggressively punished for doing so.

I'd be interested in hearing what strategies people are actually using in up-to-date high-difficulty 1.0 games (in up-to-date games from the last 2 days). I've only seen one report recently, someone on Phoebe Survival Struggle had a big symmetrical base with outer wall and inner turret lanes.

Turrets and traps are pretty buffed recently (based on feedback), I'm waiting to see how they play out as the conversation catches up to the reality of how the game actually plays.

I agree about "buff fighting with your pawns" - this is a major goal. But it's hard to say how to do that. I'm very open to suggestions here. There are challenges with this given that your pawns play by the same rules as enemy pawns; it's hard to say how to buff one side but not the other.

My current colony - tribal start Casssandra extreme. I've been abusing door peeking against raiders. My defense is literally just 4 11x11 rooms on 4 corners of my rectangular base. Each of these rooms alternates door-wall-door-wall, with a layer of sandbags in front.

Step 1: Place colonists at the doors to shoot once using weapons with low charge time.
Step 2: Immediately back off so the door shuts - most raiders won't be able to fire back.
Step 3: Wait for the raiders' status to go from "Searching for targets" to "Attacking random door/wall."
Step 4: Repeat Steps 1-3.

Step 3 is what completely breaks the AI. Normally, if you go to door peek when their status is still "Searching for targets," they will charge their ranged attack the moment your colonists re-open the door. This means they will start attacking before your colonists do. However, by waiting until they "reset" and try to attack a structure, you can get shots off without them being able to fire back because they don't change back to "firing" status until they get hit. In addition, enemies will try to run to cover first before shooting, giving you even more time to hide.

Mechs become trivial with this strategy due to their weapon's long charge time. I've also literally just 5v18ed a pirate raid with no injuries by having 4 colonists fight and 1 run around to repair walls/doors. Surely door peeking needs to be nerfed (it was even more broken in B18).

The only threat so far has come from a mechanoid drop - 1 colonist and a handful of huskies died.

[Tynan]

My current colony - tribal start Casssandra extreme. I've been abusing door peeking against raiders. My defense is literally just 4 11x11 rooms on 4 corners of my rectangular base. Each of these rooms alternates door-wall-door-wall, with a layer of sandbags in front.

Step 1: Place colonists at the doors to shoot once using weapons with low charge time.
Step 2: Immediately back off so the door shuts - most raiders won't be able to fire back.
Step 3: Wait for the raiders' status to go from "Searching for targets" to "Attacking random door/wall."
Step 4: Repeat Steps 1-3.

Step 3 is what completely breaks the AI. Normally, if you go to door peek when their status is still "Searching for targets," they will charge their ranged attack the moment your colonists re-open the door. This means they will start attacking before your colonists do. However, by waiting until they "reset" and try to attack a structure, you can get shots off without them being able to fire back because they don't change back to "firing" status until they get hit. In addition, enemies will try to run to cover first before shooting, giving you even more time to hide.

Mechs become trivial with this strategy due to their weapon's long charge time. I've also literally just 5v18ed a pirate raid with no injuries by having 4 colonists fight and 1 run around to repair walls/doors. Surely door peeking needs to be nerfed (it was even more broken in B18).

The only threat so far has come from a mechanoid drop - 1 colonist and a handful of huskies died.

Now that's a quality report right there. Step-by-step, clear, awesome.

I think the first thought here is to make the raiders smarter in a human-like way so that they're not trivially defeated by such tactics. E.g. if it was a human controlling them, he'd not have them leave the door and attack the wall over and over, he'd probably have them attack the door specifically, right?

I'd love to see a video of this in action BTW. I've seen it before but not in the 1.0 build.

Or do players like this strategy? Should it be left alone? After all, consider the topic of this thread... All opinions welcome.

[georacer]

Hello, first time posting on the forums but saw you wanted suggestions on how to buff fighting with your pawns. One thing that comes to my mind would be to buff crafting. This way you can get ahead of the raids in advance by having better weapons and armor.

[Roly]

While the goal is probably to make the fun strategies actually viable, I don't think the current design is reaching that goal.  The only way to survive on extreme is to use some type of cheese, be it aggressively reducing wealth to the point where you never develop, or other manners of cheese defenses.  It's just as punishing to actually try to fight with your pawns as it ever was, which seems to be what we should want.  But armor is weaker and RNG based, pawns still lose body parts left and right, and it's even more punishing to actually progress your colony into higher wealth levels.

Maybe it's different on lower difficulties but on higher ones the only thing the changes have done is force you to cheese even harder. I think the solution to this isn't to keep nerfing turrets and traps.  It's to buff actually fighting with your pawns so you aren't so aggressively punished for doing so.

I'd be interested in hearing what strategies people are actually using in up-to-date high-difficulty 1.0 games (in up-to-date games from the last 2 days). I've only seen one report recently, someone on Phoebe Survival Struggle had a big symmetrical base with outer wall and inner turret lanes.

Turrets and traps are pretty buffed recently (based on feedback), I'm waiting to see how they play out as the conversation catches up to the reality of how the game actually plays.

I agree about "buff fighting with your pawns" - this is a major goal. But it's hard to say how to do that. I'm very open to suggestions here. There are challenges with this given that your pawns play by the same rules as enemy pawns; it's hard to say how to buff one side but not the other.

What about buffing defense through preparation rather than simply buffing player pawns (which feels a bit cheaty). An option to 'dig in' or 'hunker down' whilst drafted that would take time to trigger but then impart a state of increased defense/aim/maybe range could provide a similar effect without imparting superhuman abilities to the player! It would reward good defensive positioning and planning but in a way that could be balanced vs offensive strategies (which the player is not forced to take part in to survive)?

[Mehni]

Or do players like this strategy? Should it be left alone? After all, consider the topic of this thread... All opinions welcome.

There aren't many battle strategies where skill comes into play. Most killboxes are "build turrets and traps, hide under the kitchen table" - the door peeking strategy is one of the very few battle modes in RimWorld where you're really involved in the fight.

As an experiment I once modded out that jobexpire mechanic. Flanking naturally became nearly impossible as raiders moved on too fast and I just wound up cheesing the AI in a really abusive manner.

I implore you to leave it as is.