Things you refuse to do in the game

[5thHorseman]

Not sure if this belongs here or in "stories." If a moderator moves it I won't feel bad at all.

I was watching a LP and the player would not allow two people to share a bed until they were married. He understood the game mechanics and knew it was sub-optimal, but he described himself as "old fashioned I guess" and left it at that. It got me thinking, is there anything I won't do in the game, because in reality I wouldn't? I mean, this is a game where I'll happily chop up raiders and feed them to my wargs, or sometimes to my colonists. In this game I leave people writhing on the floor until I can bother to get around to stripping them before they die. I made a zone for a newly-acquired pack of self-taming terriers around a poison ship so when I shot it, they went for the dogs and I could shoot the robots in the back.

Surely, there's nothing I wouldn't do?

Well, that's not true Even though there is no detriment in the game for it, I simply cannot bring myself to clad my colonists in uranium helmets. I *might* put uranium armor on them and I will happily use uranium weapons but helmets? No way. Too close to the brain.

How about anybody else? Any personal taboos that keep you from doing something that is actually beneficial (or at least not harmful) in the game?

[Scavenger]

I have a few, the mostly due to OCD haha. Some are things I do that I really shouldn't, as opposed to things I won't do that I should. Like taking trophy animals wherever I end up on the map! I'll grab a cute little pet like a raccoon or Fox as a personal pet whenever I end up in a different biome that has things I don't.

I hope to end up with a zoo sometime! That would be a worthy goal of this game. An alternate win condition.

I also do whatever I can to save my animals, up until the point where it will cost the whole colony. Giving them full access to rations during lean times. And defending them from Raiders at the cost of colonists life's.

[Shurp]

My "don'ts" are more for gameplay purposes than moral sentiment.  I don't build geothermal reactors, for example, because I enjoy the challenge of building a large enough wind/solar farm and defending it from raiders.

I don't build traps because I'm trying to avoid the "killbox" style of play of funneling enemies to certain points... although I admit my play comes pretty close with my use of perimeter walls.  (I might have to reintroduce the 50-range mod)

OK, for sentimental reasons I don't butcher/torture prisoners... in fact lately, I don't take very many prisoners.  The worsening relationships over time "feature" has removed the incentive to patch up tribals and send them on their way.  So any downed raider just becomes target practice unless they look recruitable.

Breeding animals just takes too long, and there's always herds of caribou around in a boreal forest, so I usually don't bother.

[glob]

I wouldn't accept gay pawns

[kenmtraveller]

I don't accept cannibals.

[Dargaron]

Not sure if I'm motivated by empathy for pawns or if I'm subconsciously doing it for selfish reasons, but I don't think I've ever given my colonists bedrooms that are smaller than 4-by-5.

I usually capture and either recruit or release pirate pawns: I don't think I've ever actually executed a prisoner once they're captured (I've lost a bunch to infections/prison breaks, but it's their fault that they decided to try escaping right into Security Officer Polar Bear #2).

Usually don't steal organs: again, might be that I subconsciously avoid the mood penalty on my colonists, so not entirely altruistic motives here.

[Morak]

I have never made a human leather hat. I don't harvest human skin.

[erdrik]

No cannibalism, no using or selling drugs(excluding Penoxycyline, Ambrosia, Smokeleaf; never social), no trap corridors, no mazes, no shotguns, no Sharp melee, gold or silver is currency or for Adv. Component only, no selling buying or harvesting pawns(corpses, prisoners, or colonists regardless of origin) ...

Thats all I can think of off the top of my head.

[Scavenger]

I I have also never used traps that I can remember. Always felt too cheap and easy. Along with traditional kill boxes. I might reconsider traps now, with a heavy number limit after the rework. Still no to kill boxes, although they don't function quite as well thankfully.

[Third_Of_Five]

I refuse to make killboxes.
They feel like cheating and wouldn't be a viable defense IRL, because real people aren't stupid enough to just walk to their deaths like that. Instead, I prefer to settle on a river, as it creates a natural defensive barrier that can act almost like a natural killbox. At least it feels less cheaty.

Also if any of my animals/prisoners are about to die from disease and there's nothing I can do, I euthanize them via an operation. It's a waste of medicine but it feels more humane.

[Nynzal]

This is really interesting! When thinking about it, I never base my choices on the "assumed feelings" of colonists or pawns in general - I mostly do what is best for the colony as the playing overlord. I will keep in mind to make a playthrough being as humane as possible. I already did two with a cannibal who basically murdered everyone in cold blood who entered the vicinity.

Also interesting is the "refraining from killbox playstyle". Imagine you are a group of survivors and some hostiles want to raid you. There is literally no reason to not try and outsmart them with hidden traps or ambushes in form of open areas with setup crossfire by turrets that are not visible when outside the walls. Why ever risk a shootout when I can drop a stone on someones head. Although I definetly understand it from a gameplay perspective.

Also interesting controversy with being civilized vs just do whatever to have it better. With the not accepting gays; I dont understand why you would ever do that, but hey ... not judging here. Myself, I noticed I mostly refuse the pawns who distrust a gender. It kinda makes me think "wtf is wrong with you" - although harsh survival conditions make things like this more likely just from the psychological standpoint.

[Dargaron]

The primary argument (besides Homophobia, which isn't worth discussing) for refusing gay colonists is that, due to the rarity of the trait, you are quite unlikely to get a nother Gay character of the same gender and appropriate age for a Romance.

Your gay pawn is then likely to start making relationship attempts on people with incompatible orientations (because the algorithm for determining social interactions doesn't take the orientation of the recipient into consideration). This leads to both mood penalties (for both the recipient and the instigator of the romance attempt) and also causes a fairly-hefty Social debuff, which makes those colonists more likely to Insult one another in future. This leads to Social Fights (which can result in crushed fingers/toes, or worse if one party has a melee weapon), as well as mental breaks from the mood penalty.

I haven't ever turned down a colonist specifically because he/she was Gay (usually it's because they have a skillset I don't need, or have some kind of nasty health problem), but I do weed out Misogynists/Misandrists unless they have a very good set of traits/skills (or I'm desperate for extra bodies), for similar reasons.

[bbqftw]

Since female pawns are superior due to 85% lower chance of propositioning people (male with no relationship is like having pessimist lite due to all the rejections), gay male pawns are fine for colony stability, better than non gay males, since you should be striving for almost all female colony anyways.

[Dargaron]

I don't know, isn't it just unattached male pawns that are the problem? Because the benefits from an active relationship are enormous (for both the happy couple and the folks who attend the wedding), and I don't think I've ever had a pawn who's already in a relationship making a pass at an unassociated pawn. So the ideal colony would be couples in the 20-30 age range (you know, to avoid aging health problems), with one set of Lovers marrying per year. Or am I forgetting something?

[bbqftw]

Yes, which is why you want to avoid an excess of male pawns. That is a very important aspect of stability.

Couples has its own problem since I am often firing people from the colony as their replacements are found and would rather not want them showing up in prisoner quests. Bit if you're not playing that way then just making sure the females outnumber the males should be effective.