Upgrade or not, pros and cons

[Pangaea]

Looks like I haven't been around, nor played the game, for about 3 years. In the meantime, two DLCs have released, plus a horde of patches. I'm not really interested in the DLCs as they are quite expensive and didn't sound all that interesting to me. The version I have is 1.0.2282, which is presumably about 3 years old. The wiki isn't exactly up to date (I recall trying to do a shit-ton over there way back when), but I read from some pages there and the blog that many weapons have been nerfed into the ground, and then pounded further down. Which appears to have made base defense pretty much useless, if what I read here and there is to be believed.

Back when I played, this aspect was a lot of fun to me. Slowly build a base, hopefully survive long enough to get some recruits, and eventually grotesque aliens land and try to kill you and everything you hold dear. To have any chance to withstand such onslaughts, base defense in the form of turrets were needed. Sure, most of them up in each raid, but while alive they helped. So then... is this whole aspect of the game pretty much a thing of the past, when turrets have been nerfed so brutally hard, and even have their costs increased?

What kind of pros and cons are there to upgrade from 1.0 to 1.3, or even one in the middle? I bought the game directly here so am not sure if it's possible to upgrade to e.g. 1.2, or if the download site only has the last version.

Hopefully a few people are still active here and can help shed some light on this stuff 50-ish patch notes with lots of DLC stuff in there is too much to take in right now =)

[Canute]

Hi,
you are right. from 1.0 to 1.3 there arn't any big changes.
Just some bug fixes, some improvments and maybe what i forget.
When you still play a colony at 1.0 stay with 1.0.
But when you want start a new one you should switch to 1.3 !!
At last to use latest mods since mods don't get developed for 1.0 anymore.

New content only comes with the DLCs.
At last royalty got many nice stuff like new mechs, psychic power and royalty title chain to become the new emperor.
Maybe watch some playthough videos from others about Royalty and Ideology.

[Pangaea]

Cheers. Do you really have 9999 posts? May wanna think about your next one

Found the download email and for better or worse, it only has the latest 1.3, so I couldn't use version 1.1 or 1.2 if I wanted. I'm not interested in the DLCs, which makes it a bit hard to know what is in the game now. But am I correct in saying that without the DLCs the game will mostly be the same as before, as in not having all this psycast crap and suchlike?

I looked over a LOT of mod pages yesterday, and it looks like some of them haven't been updated to 1.3, and remains on 1.0. Think Vanilla Bionics Expanded was updated, but it looked worse for mods such as Don'tBlockDoor, PickupandHaul, CommonSense, Achtung, and probably many others. Are there viable alternatives for those that don't work any more? Looking over the previous install, I had some 20-ish mods. Doubt I actually used them all, but I do recall how great some of these QoL mods were. Think it was Achtung that allowed us to 'draw' out colonists for combat without ordering every single one individually each time. That was a big time saver when there are frequent raids.

My main concern with updating is the very heavy nerfs to cannons and the like. If Tynan hates base defense so much, maybe just remove all those turrets entirely? How does it actually play these days, is it still possible to withstand the 50+ mech raids, or are you pretty much dead at the first mech raid these days due to the aforementioned brutal nerf to turrets and the like? They were never enough on their own, but without them it was downright impossible to defend against such mech hordes. I recall that especially the inferno cannon mechs would pretty much put all my guys and gals on fire and cause them to run into the middle of combat, getting killed. So when I then see turrets getting half or worse damage, half or worse penetration, less range, and double costs (refill), plus less ammo as well, it looks like a raised middle finger to all people who liked to get into the end game and try to defend against such hordes. So if they are the proverbial "knife in a gunfight" these days, I'd rather stay on 1.0 :-(

Cover and HP on defensive structures have been nerfed too I see. Making big raids even more impossible with only colonist defenders.

[Canute]

Yes, without steam you only can get the latest version.
But i don't think you should even play 1.1 or 1.2 anymore.
Yes psycast and such crap are DLC content, but you can find alot mods that add similar.
Where did you look for mods ? This forum ?
Forget it, many modder left the forum and only published their mods at steam workshop only.
You should check my 1. signature link about that.
Even when some mod-dev didn't upgrade his project anymore, maybe someone else pickup it and made a 1.3 version.

Btw. i am stuck at 9999.

[Pangaea]

Yes, without steam you only can get the latest version.
But i don't think you should even play 1.1 or 1.2 anymore.
Yes psycast and such crap are DLC content, but you can find alot mods that add similar.
Where did you look for mods ? This forum ?
Forget it, many modder left the forum and only published their mods at steam workshop only.
You should check my 1. signature link about that.
Even when some mod-dev didn't upgrade his project anymore, maybe someone else pickup it and made a 1.3 version.

Btw. i am stuck at 9999.

Thanks. I've installed the 1.3 version of the game (have both now), and downloaded some mods. Earlier I looked through a lot of threads here on the forum. Many were not updated, but some were, and at least they took me to the github links. Those are the mods I've downloaded now. Thank goodness some people still use open source sites like that, instead of locking everything behind steam.

However, some mods seem to only exist behind steam's tall walls now, and I can't seem to get RimPy working correctly. Or I'm doing something wrong. Would like to get Bionic Icons for example, which I haven't found on github or other legitimate sites. Would also like a storyteller mod called Adaptive Cassie, which appears to be named Adaptive Threats now. But that one too looks to only reside on steam

Would be great with some ideas here, I wrote in the thread in your signature too.

Started a quick game earlier, and I see there are some new UI elements in the bottom menu bar, and don't think the Quest tab was there in 1.0 either? That alone could be worth using 1.3. Otherwise things looked much the same, but I need to actually play to get a feel for things. Would just like to get a few more mods working first, so great if you are able to help me with getting RimPy to download steam mods anonymously. Seems to be the only way :-|

[Pangaea]

Got things installed and rolling again, partly thanks to steamCMD, which made it possible to download some mods that were locked behind steam's tall, barb-wired walls. Now have more or less the same setup as last time 3 years ago. Nothing fancy mods-wise, but I do like QoL and better pawn AI, so Common Sense, Haul While You're Up, Better Pawn Control, Achtung and some bits and pieces, plus some more bionics options, but not strutting into OP territory, with Vanilla Bionics Expanded.

As per usual I'm a slow trucker in the early game, and enjoy just getting by with a few rooms, for probably longer than I should. Into winter year 1, and still haven't dug into the mountains at all, only used the small coves that we had early on, and made them a little deeper over time. The mountain is to our east, and I hope it's an actual mountain, and not a wide open area behind a thin layer of rock. Only now realised it's marble over there instead of granite, but it will have to do. At least it's easier to dig into. Think I have to start plotting down some plans, but I'm never sure what to do, and keep postponing and postponing it.

Perhaps I can use this thread for a few updates. Shame the forum is on life support now, but it's still nice to write about what happens. This map happened to have a really nice area for us early on, with a good choke point. Have put up a little wall and barrikades, and so far it has been okay, although the last two raids were a close call. Everybody in hospital and a few people almost bled out. It's fun to start out as tribals because the early game (and research) is postponed a huge deal compared with crashlanded -- but it means the raids in year 1 can be brutal, when you have bows and come up against bolt action, revolvers and frag granades. No electricity or any fancy, shmancy stuff like that either 

Changes to animals are pretty huge, and it took a while until I understood how to pen them in. Apparently you can't have barrikades all across the front gates, because then the stupid gits can't pass over it.

I'm playing this one Cassandra "Blood and lust" (or some such name, they're all new now!), with the Adaptive Threats storyteller mod. If it works like the previous version (Adaptive Cassie), it is a little less brutal in the early game, and relies more on pawns and less on wealth, but will become more brutal than vanilla Cassandra in the late game. Hopefully we live that long.

[Pangaea]

Says the picture has 3 views, which I suppose means there are virtually nobody using the forum any more. Sad.

Into year 3, and a nasty ship just landed with 4 pikes and 3 lancers. I see the gun range of pikers are extreme, so really hard to deal with those. Base-wise, we finally started to dig into the mountain. Nobody have moved in yet (except an ascetic we didn't have a room for), but the freezer and kitchen are dug out, plus a bunch of rooms. Not sure if this actually works, but I've also dug a long corridor that I hoped would be a bug trap. Think we've had four infestations so far, and none down there, not even the last one when that whole room was finished. So maybe it doesn't actually work. That will be a huge problem when we actually live in the place.

Otherwise I'm undecided on how to set up things, as so much has changed in 1.3. With so many sappers and breachers and the like, maybe turrets are more of a problem than a help now. Sick how quickly those breachers cut through freakin' MOUNTAINS. Don't have even the miniturret researched yet, but at least we have access to electricity now. The starting base still operates on wood, but there is a crafting room by the wind turbines with electric benches. Food is an issue without a freezer. And a long toxic fallout killed off absolutely everything, including trees, and it takes probably a year to grow back, so we're still hurting from that.

Actually have a lot of colonists now, some gained on the road when our 5-people party almost got wiped trying to rescue somebody. Not many of them are all that good, however, and shooting skills especially is woeful on almost everybody. Think I have two people with more than 10 skill, with most in 0-5. Really hope we can get some proper good recruits at some point, because training up shooting is very, very slow when they have no passion.

We're alive though, so there is that, and no killbox or stuff like that yet. It is presumably needed in some form, because raids are starting to ramp up now. Wealth is ove 100k despite not really doing anything to increase it, but it keeps slowly trickling up it seems. Recently captured two prisoners. We had three, but one couldn't be saved. Got into bed and had 10 seconds to live. But the other badly wounded person somehow survived with only 2% blood left and 0.3 hours on the clock. Strange how that works out, huh?

At least the prisoners has the sense to stay in bed when injured. My people do not. As soon as they are physically capable of moving, they'll start to crawl around to get recreation, pick up a meal, eat, or clean. It droved me batshit when I played 3 years ago, and would absolutely love to find a solution to it. Setting up two-tiles allowed zones for all of them in bed isn't going to be fun. If that even works :-|

Anyway, it's been fun to play this game again, and I hope we can survive longer. First need to deal with that ship. When some pikes drop podded in earlier, they killed or shot a bunch of penned animals, which I no longer can zone to a safe area, including a bonded pet, so that hurt.

Added a picture of the base too. Stretch to call it a "base", but yeah

[Alenerel]

In short. Upgrade always to the latest version. It only gets better.

About the DLCs. Royalty introduces psycast, which are abilities for your pawns, mostly combat.
Ideology adds a lot of content but only if you care about it. For example, if you like to roleplay, you will love ideology. In my case, I dont roleplay at all, so I make an useful ideology to make the game easier to play.