Ideas related to allies and enemies, visitors and such.

[Vas]

First idea, alerts.
I'd like to see, is a red alert zone.  A button that when I click, will alert ALL colonists that there are enemies in bound.  Maybe even require them to have a hand held radio device in their inventory (Like, equipped but not take up the usual slots, as it is small) (maybe even require building radio towers for range of communication.) so when colonists are way out far off doing stuff and have a radio, and you click the red alert button, they all fall back to an area you have marked as the "safe zone".  This is where all non-military mode NPCs go, and they do jobs found only in the red alert zone as if there is no path outside that zone.  This would be like marking home zone or roofless zone.  But another color.



Second idea, ally aid.
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Third idea, bases.
I'd like to see a more advanced version AIs building in your map.  Instead of them just moving in, building two mortars, and some sandbags, they could end up building a whole town and bunker it in and stuff in your area, and if you don't put a stop to it soon, they may end up taking over the map, and having a permanent foothold in your territory.  I don't believe this would be too terribly hard, I mean you can tell the game to save blueprints for building layouts and stuff, so when the enemy wants to build a bedroom, they choose from 3 available bedroom types and find resources they can use to construct it.  I wouldn't mind helping make some blueprints even for NPCs to use for bases.  Anyhow, moving on with the rest of this idea.

Now that you have an enemy base in your territory, resources of the map are hurt that much more.  You can't mine in their territory, or you might get shot at, and same for them.  However, they are AI, so they avoid anywhere they have been shot at, so maybe the enemy AI puts an "avoid area" zone down in areas that have turrets or visible defenses, and at whatever locations they were shot at by turrets.  This prevents them from taking jobs in those areas.  Same goes for you, you can place down avoidance zones to prevent your colonists from automatically taking jobs in those areas, and are required to walk around it rather than through it to get to the other side.

However, this idea isn't just for enemies to move in, but allies as well.  If an allied faction sets up a base in your territory, or even just a small outpost, you could both set a trade zone, maybe use the radio that lets you talk to traders to talk to the outpost people, and it have more options for people who are in your area so you can ask for them to deliver a certain item to your "Shared Stockpile", or even just that orbital drop thingy (the AI can carry it to your base, rather than orbitally dropping it in).  They may request something in return, most likely gold delivered to their area  Stock piles would have a new option on them, allowing allies to take from them.  If something is in a stock pile, you can't take it if it isn't yours, unless you manually click on it and click "steal ____" rather than "Haul ____".  This would be a default option for enemies that want to steal your stuff.

We all know that AI would have a difficult time mining and such, so maybe they get drops of stuff from their home base every so often to keep them well supplied with food and all if they need it.  Pretty much like when they first arrive (in the event where they set up mortars and such).



Fourth idea, planning.
Late game enemy raids are killer on pretty much any computer.  The enemy AI should be more intelligent than just running forth for the nearest door.  They often completely ignore structures that are walled off completely and go for the nearest door.  Even ignoring turrets till they are first fired upon by them.  I think the enemy AI should be able to plan their attacks.  Enemy spawns that spawn with "and are planning their attack" should actually plan, rather than wander around aimlessly for a minute before charging in without any plan at all other than to suicide themselves upon my one door with 30 turrets, when there was a vulnerable spot half way down the mountain that was a one block thick wall or even one block thick rock that they could have gone over to and just blown a hole into it or even mined it and charged into your base that way.

If the only way in looks like a death trap, they should learn to make a way in.  Mining a tunnel 2 to 3 blocks in width into your base from another part of the mountain.  If it looks like they can't get in even through that method, then they should call for reinforcement supplies, and switch from an assault, to long range bombardment with mortars and food supplies.  Depending on the numbers, depends on how many mortars they build so if you are too heavily defended and a large army comes flying in, you could end up having 5-8 mortars to defeat before your base ends up as Swiss cheese.



fifth idea, visitor areas!
It would be nice to be able to build a visitor area, with green beds rather than standard color stuff, or like the prisoner area turns orange, the visitor area turns green when you click on a visitor bed.  Maybe with a home zone type setup, you can add a visitor area zone as well that turns one area of the map into a visitor zone where visitors will automatically try and go towards.

If you put food and stuff in this area, it automatically puts a forbidden label on it so your colonists don't go pick it up later.  This way only  the visitors can interact with the items there.  If you have visitor beds and such, they can rest and stay in your area for a while, perhaps even give the chance of one or two of them joining your colony before they leave, or even a random event where they may drop some silver or a weapon or something to leave for you for taking care of them so well.

This are could also be used to tend to wounded allies of battle, like I mentioned in the second idea on this page.



Sixth idea, ability to hide.
Why is it the enemy always ALWAYS knows where you are?  They could land half way across the map, and know where everything is, even if it was hidden under thick rock roof which they couldn't possibly know at all.  Especially if they are cave men.  I could have mined a hole in a mountain in the middle of the area and one of my people is out there in it, and the raiders pile themselves up inside there because they know one poor sap was mining hidden away under 50 tons of earth because of their phychic mental link with the world and knowing where everything and everyone is.  I'd like the ability to tell a colonist to hide, which makes him lay down and try to stay concealed in the darkness, so enemy raiders who are walking into the cave, have less chance of seeing him.

I'd also like it so that the enemy can only know where things are that aren't hidden under thick rock roof, or even normal rock roof.  They can only see where things are within range of their body, or know where things are from landing and having seen the metal roof areas and stuff under the open sky.  Everything else is a mystery to them.



Seventh, raiding the enemy.
This is my last idea on this specific set of ideas.  The enemy can raid me, why can't I raid them?  What if I built a command module that could send my team and some supplies, to another location on the map?  You already have the map implemented in the game, so you choose where you land on it when you start playing.  Now you have this new building that will let you choose a location to attack, or even move to if you need to move your colony (unrelated to this particular idea but I'll go into it some here anyway).

So there are two options for the building, either you make it use orbital drop methods, or it is built like a caravan station and you send supplies and people into it than click expedite mission to xxx-xxx.  This is after you've selected a location on the map to travel to, if you go to an enemy base, it's an automatic raid.  If you go to an allied base, it's a potential raid of an ally village which sets them as enemy permanently (maybe).  You use your own colonists for this, and your home town is paused during this event.  You have full access to everything in your build menus, and can build a base there however you want, however allies won't like you building in their territory, so the more things you build, the lower their standings with you get, till they hit breaking point and declare war on you, or demand you leave.  (Could be an event that pops up and gives you the option of declare war, or leaving peacefully, declare war is -50 standing hit, leaving peacefully is +15 standing.)

A break off of this idea was moved here; https://ludeon.com/forums/index.php?topic=7345.0



EDIT:
eighth idea, prisoners.
I'd like to be able to release a prisoner for a rep bonus with whoever I released.  With the added risk that instead of a rep bonus, they come back for a vengeful attack that is better planned out than a full on raid.

Whatever happened to fear?  Torture devices and such like savage beatings.  These things are so useful in effecting a colony and it's standings with others.



EDIT 2:
Ninth idea, tribute.
This would let you bribe the enemy raiders into leaving your territory.  You open coms with the people who are attacking through your communication array, and click the bribe button.  They say how much it will cost you to get them to leave, and if you have that amount, they will go.  This could work like trading too, so that everything in your trade stockpile will count as trade-able.  Like money wise and all.  Those items then disappear, and the raiders "flee" from your territory.  Though, could have it say "The raiders are leaving as agreed" instead.  Or "The raiders have withdrawn."  Something like that.  If the raiders don't like you enough that nothing will work, clicking brine will open up a screen that says "We will never accept a bribe from you" or something similar.



Tenth idea, sliders.
I dislike how it costs 300 silver to increase my friendship with other colonies.  I'd like a slider like used in the trade menu that gives me points per silver.  Perhaps it should let you use ALL materials, with different points per item rates.  Depending on that colony's wants and needs.  A rich colony wouldn't really want silver, so giving them silver wouldn't help much.  Maybe they want wood, because they live in a desert.  A forest tribe won't want wood, they might want metal and silver.  Etc.

[litlbear]

I like it all, especially #2 and #7

[Kelian]

I like most of these especially 1-5.

In regards to the raids. I just had a mysterious ship crash land right outside my walled in courtyard. It had a low level physic drone and the game prompted me to destroy it because it was dangerous. I gathered up all ten of my colonists, including the original three and made a firing line. When I unleashed hell from the line, the pod blew up and four centipedes with six scythers emerged. The centipedes blew open my wall and the scythers started using my sandbag defense inside my own courtyard against me. The battle lasted forever and I lost seven colonists, even WITH the help of ultra's forest who I called from the comm to come help. I had a ship built so the last survivor of my original three was the lucky one that got to escape. The colony was pretty much effed from that raid, there no way the two colonists would of survived after because they both sucked at farming and growing. The base had a ton of damage and fires were raging inside my base.

Raids can be pretty devastating. I've never had dumb AI door rushes in any of my games. They've always waited until dark, sieged, or blew walls up.

[Vas]

If I am able, I will record and upload one of my standard tactics for defending against anything.  I'm not sure if I can upload a youtube video of this at this current time however.

[BetaSpectre]

Raider Bases may have some issue if your walls are near by them. They'll ignore colonist fire and get all killed if they spawned some items inside of your walls as it is now with Mortar/sand bags.

It doesn't make sense to make permanent settlements next to a hostile one, so why would Pirates? I could understand settlers if you're they're allies, but nor Space Pirates even the Mortar construction is a bit iffy if you ask me.

[Vas]

Raider Bases may have some issue if your walls are near by them. They'll ignore colonist fire and get all killed if they spawned some items inside of your walls as it is now with Mortar/sand bags.

It doesn't make sense to make permanent settlements next to a hostile one, so why would Pirates? I could understand settlers if you're they're allies, but nor Space Pirates even the Mortar construction is a bit iffy if you ask me.

That's why I suggested fixes for this, ways to avoid these issues.

E.G. Raiders only collect materials that are within certain range of their constructed items.