Why does my colony suck at combat? pls help...

[Goo Poni]

Hehe that image in my head of colonist vs turtle fist fight cracks me up.

I found the screenshots of such nonsense. Angry Tortoise 2 - 0 Colonists.

And yes, in very small numbers, your own tactics and skill of your colonists plus the weapons they use is certainly more notable. But only when it's less than like 5-6 pawns total across both sides. Once you move higher than that, with the number of bullets a raiding team can put downrange, especially with the likes of Project Armoury which introduces a terrifying number of automatic weapons, colonists will die. Your typical colony of 10-12 cannot put out enough shots at range with M-24s to drop 30-40 tribals before they're throwing Pila, drawing bows and stabbing with pointy sticks. If you try to go for massed LMG fire, you'll probably find you still can't hold because the LMGs don't put them down at all and at worst, stun them then have long downtimes between bursts. Shotguns? It's a little too late for shotgunning.

I modded the Lee Enfield to be able to cycle rounds every two seconds. -AND- I gave it a range of about 70 tiles with perfect accuracy at all ranges. My 20 colonists cannot kill a typical raiding team before they're in range despite the pretty big advantages given to them with these Enfields. Legs are lost. Eyes are lost. Arms are lost. Even with most of the colony being more machine than man with bionic arms, legs, eyes and minds, they cannot kill fast enough. Added to that, such fast fire rates on the Enfields have unveiled a certain kind of overkill where everyone will target the closest raider, fire, start aiming again and then that one raider will die and everyone starts aiming again at a new raider. It wastes valuable time that they don't have and the fix is extreme micromanagement, turning the game into a slideshow as I get every colonist to target a different raider in the mass of bodies charging towards them so that hopefully they continue firing for longer and misses on their intended target still hit someone in the approaching flood of flesh. Not to mention that any raider lucky enough to spawn with an Enfield is also firing back from well beyond effective ranges but it doesn't matter because if you just throw enough shit, something will stick and, by god, do those 2-3% hit chances at nighttime through 30 different trees and rocks stick a helluva lot.

I find melee has another big problem in that you can stack up bodies. Raiders do it all the time. If you peg someone in melee, it stuns them and forces them to stay in position for a while which means another raider can clip through the first one and peg you again. And another, and another, and another, and soon it's an orgy with 6-7 raiders pounding on a single colonist that is being stunlocked in position. Playing with the zombies mod exaggerated this greatly because once the first couple months had passed, if someone was caught while kiting 30-40 zombies around, they were dead. So many hits land on them that they just turn red and stay red until they fall over or outright die.

[juanitierno]

I think what is discussed here is the "ironman landing" problem.

If Ironman had no "inertial dampeners" of any sort, Tony would be turned into a red jelly on the first of those cool landings he does (the instant desacceleration is just the same as if he just hit the ground with no suit).

Similarly, a non-dampened ironman suit hit by a truck, would be like Tony being hit by an armor-shaped truck.

I think a large stone club actually hits harder than a bullet. When the bullet is fired, half the energy is used to fire the bullet, and the other half is transferred to the body and the gun in the form of recoil (you are essentially catching another bullet with your bare hand, its just this second bullet is larger and has a grip). Now imagine being hit in the hand with a large stone club

[A_Soft_Machine_Man]

My biggest issue in RimWorld combat are the pirate snipers that begin showing uo mid-to-late game, and to a lesser extent Scythers.

While I'm typically able to circumvent the sniper issue by setting up a large enough kill room, I've had some colonies where it simply isn't viable for a variety of reasons (isn't supported by terrain, no close steam vents and too little space for mass solar panels/windmills, etc.) and by the late game I really begin to suffer when six or more pirates are armed with M24s.

I'm basically wondering if there's any good "anti-sniper" tactics beyond just arming up colonists with M24s and Lee Enfields and hoping for the best. I've tried rushing them down with shotgunners/melee specialists after dispatching their friends, but tend to take high casualties just due to how accurate their fire is. Worse, when I just set up countersnipers I still take extreme casualties, with one or more getting maimed while their return fire either misses outright, or damages them in a way that doesn't impede their accuracy.

[erdrik]

Now that beeing said I belive we should be carefull when asuming power armor is a 100% body covering armor wh 40k style. Yes it covers arms and legs but where does it says it covers all of it?

And yet it is significantly better at stopping bullets.
In the very next game, my power armor equip shotgunner withstood 4 barrages of a mechaoids charge blaster with no injury.
Pretty sure the fat bugger would have been injured if power armor was not full coverage.

You seem to have fallen into that classic trap of trying to apply real world logic and physics to game logic and physics, OP. Zerkuran is not helping this.

I only brought up real world stuff in response to Zerkuran.
Typically I try to avoid the subject because:

Real world science is irrelevant.

For the most part, but not entirely.
Depends on the game, and Rimworld does seem to want to try to link itself to realism in some small degree.
In this case realism is important so far as immersion and in game consistency is concerned.
Basically its a colony survival game that follows certain recognizable rules.
Unlike Don't Starve, which is an individual survival game that follows a made up set of rules.
Thing is... Don't Starve is far more 'real' to me, because it is consistent and immersive in how it follows those rule sets.

In real life, kevlar will stop some bullets, but it will not stop a club. Heck, Kevlar will not stop knives.  It should be no surprise that different armor types will effect attacks from different weapons differently.

When did I claim Kevlar could stop a club?!
No shit it won't stop knives, its basically synthetic cloth.
The point was that bullets are powerful and can penetrate metal, and it requires obscene thickness or special tech to stop them.
It was a specific argument to a specific point.

Similarly, a non-dampened ironman suit hit by a truck, would be like Tony being hit by an armor-shaped truck.

The mass of a stone club is not equal to the mass of a truck.
The mass needs to manageable so the person using it can actually wield it

Why is everyone acting like I don't want stone clubs to do damage?!
I understand they are heavy. I get they hit hard.
Im saying, based off what else power armor can take, and its described tech level, it should be able to take most of it.

I think a large stone club actually hits harder than a bullet. ...

I don't. Show me a video of a stone club penetrating 1/2 in. thick steel plate.
Then I will believe you.

(you are essentially catching another bullet with your bare hand, its just this second bullet is larger and has a grip). Now imagine being hit in the hand with a large stone club

Why would I imagine that? The argument is against a power armored individual, not a bare hand.

[MikhailBoho]

I think the issue has less to do with realism and more to do with game balance. If clubs did little damage to power armor, then late game raids from tribals would be easy and meaningless. Considering the player can get a whole army of power armor clad warriors and you can make your enemies only the tribal factions, it would throw late game warfare completely out of whack if their primary wweapons were not a threat to you.

[REMworlder]

I'm basically wondering if there's any good "anti-sniper" tactics beyond just arming up colonists with M24s and Lee Enfields and hoping for the best. I've tried rushing them down with shotgunners/melee specialists after dispatching their friends, but tend to take high casualties just due to how accurate their fire is. Worse, when I just set up countersnipers I still take extreme casualties, with one or more getting maimed while their return fire either misses outright, or damages them in a way that doesn't impede their accuracy.

Two good approaches: a)sneak in close and hit in face, and b)pop out of cover to distract and countersnipe without return fire

a)Against snipers, using line of sight-breaking cover is a great way to get up close and shoot them in the face. Whenever an M-24 user's line of sight/fire is broken he has to "warmup," or re-aim and reload, for around 4.3 seconds.  Use that to minimize incoming fire, or eliminate it completely, while you get in close.

b) http://i.imgur.com/gWFU0lU.jpg
Pop decoy colonists out of hard cover and let the enemy aim at them. Return them to cover before fired on. While the enemy is aiming at the closest target, the decoys, have your own snipers aim at theirs so they can get at least one shot off without return fire. Click intensive but worth it if you don't have much cover to gapclose for melee with.

[erdrik]

I think the issue has less to do with realism and more to do with game balance. If clubs did little damage to power armor, then late game raids from tribals would be easy and meaningless. Considering the player can get a whole army of power armor clad warriors and you can make your enemies only the tribal factions, it would throw late game warfare completely out of whack if their primary wweapons were not a threat to you.

Well sure if they only ever had stone weapons.
But the fact you get raided is pretty good evidence that these towns are not in a vacuum.
Just give late game tribals better weapons.
Steel clubs are something they could conceivably learn to make. (mid game)
And Plasteel is something they could conceivably trade for and craft into clubs. (late game)

For the last time, clubs vs power armor is not what I have issue with.
It is stone clubs vs power armor.

Thats why I asked if it is just a balance issue not gotten to yet.
Because frankly the current setup is not balanced. Its either lazy or incomplete.
And I know Tynan is not lazy. A simple look at the change log shows that much.

[REMworlder]

Yep, it's an alpha for sure!

[A_Soft_Machine_Man]

Two good approaches: a)sneak in close and hit in face, and b)pop out of cover to distract and countersnipe without return fire

a)Against snipers, using line of sight-breaking cover is a great way to get up close and shoot them in the face. Whenever an M-24 user's line of sight/fire is broken he has to "warmup," or re-aim and reload, for around 4.3 seconds.  Use that to minimize incoming fire, or eliminate it completely, while you get in close.

b) http://i.imgur.com/gWFU0lU.jpg
Pop decoy colonists out of hard cover and let the enemy aim at them. Return them to cover before fired on. While the enemy is aiming at the closest target, the decoys, have your own snipers aim at theirs so they can get at least one shot off without return fire. Click intensive but worth it if you don't have much cover to gapclose for melee with.

Okay, I see what you mean and I gave it a try. The sight-breaking (what I often do to cheese scythers) worked well against one or two pirate snipers, but soon lost its usefulness when I was confronted with 5+ snipers per raid/siege. Ultimately, I think my problems stem from the sheer quantity of snipers and the volume of fire they put out, as I can sight break one or two but then lose my sight-breaker to the remaining snipers.

I do appreciate the tips, though. Made the early game much more palatable.

[darkrage000]

still doesnt alleviate the problem with skills not matching abilites in shooting.

ive had a guy in perfect condition with a 20/20 shooting who can only hit about 1 of every 5 shots against a TORTISE 2 grid blocks away.

[Malcom347]

still doesnt alleviate the problem with skills not matching abilites in shooting.

ive had a guy in perfect condition with a 20/20 shooting who can only hit about 1 of every 5 shots against a TORTISE 2 grid blocks away.

When you go to fire at an opponent, hover over the target and it'll pop-up with the reasons for the calculated hit chance. Not saying its perfect. But its all a mix of distance, cover, target size, weapon accuracy, Weapon health, Sight and if the target is prone or not.

Also; Some weapons (snipers) actually have terrible accuracy at short/touch ranges.