RimWorld (New DF-like)

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Paingod
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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I'm on my third colony attempt since 1.0. I'm not restarting because I'm failing, but rather because I keep wanting to try slightly different things.

For the first one, I did my standard Cassandra/Medium Mountain base. I put it into stasis so I could try something different. I was using the Crash Survivors scenario and didn't have a whole lot of rhyme or reason to my survivors. They did well, though. The only big problem I had was with Infestations (which I have a mod for now - I can build Bait now). I didn't feel like there was enough challenge, though.

For the second one I did a Cassandra/Medium plains base. I started a set of Tribals who all had Transhumanist as a trait, imagining them worshipping Synths. The base building went well, but I ultimately got frustrated with pretty consistent raid schemes that made a static turtle setup invalid. I built The Wall, and the game walked around it by dropping pods and sending mortars. I put this one into stasis to try another mountain base.

I'm on my third attempt now, trying out Rough with Cassandra. I took my time spawning worlds and looking for a good mix of map setup, mountain strength, access to roads, and even a flowing water source for power. I think I found something that satisfies all those. I started on an Asphalt Road, in a Mountain, with a Creek, and no Caves. It's a hard combo to pull off. I had to scour four worlds seeded at 100% coverage to find it.

My tribals this time were all abducted in their youths by space pirates. The pirates forced them into distinctly different roles on the ship, mostly so they wouldn't have to do any work themselves and could focus on pillaging. The tribals bonded as a group and eventually seized on an opportunity to escape to a desolate corner of the last world the pirates landed on. As tribals, they do have some difficulty with adapting technology and are all fascinated with body modifications (I just love the concept of the Transhumanist trait). They all started severely malnourished and only had basic weapons to fend for themselves. They ran until their feet couldn't keep moving and decided to settle where they collapsed, just off the side of a large road.

We have Dragon (Builder/Blacksmith), Penguin (Gardener/Warden), Squid (Art/Intellectual), Raven (Animals/Shooting), and Jaguar (Medic/Cooking). All of them have some minor passion for shooting and gardening, essential skills for wilderness survival. Because Raven showed aptitude for combat, the pirates thought it would be amusing to replace his hands with Power Claws and used him as front-line fodder (I did use balanced points and gave my tribals negative penalities - scars, mangled limbs, malnutrition, and cryosickness - to offset the cost of two free artificial combat limbs).

Dragon and Squid immediately set to work hollowing out the mountain for security. Penguin and Jaguar started planting crops and cutting down trees to help survive the coming winter. Raven went out hunting with the tribe's only Short Bow to help provide for their immediate needs. A small ruined shack served as a place to bed down out of the rain for several days. They had brought a clutch of ostrich eggs they stole from one of the pirates, thinking they might make good pets eventually - or at worst, food - and some meager, tasteless Pemmican.

It didn't take long for a hostile tribal scout to track them down and thought they'd be easy prey. Instead, they mercilessly mobbed over him and cut him to ribbons. Now they had a second Short Bow.

The first few days were spent just recovering their strength, getting a feel for the land, and simply surviving. The caves they carved into the mountain eventually provided respite from an extreme heat wave, staying cool enough at night even though they suffered heat stroke during the day. There was no time to dally and hide; the storms foretold a harsh winter coming.

Several other small bands of robbers found them, all of them suffering the same fate as the scout. Scavenging off the dead provided everyone some kind of ranged weapon - be it a poor Revolver or awful bow. They felt confident in their ability to defend themselves. Things were looking up until one raid that went sideways. They took up their normal positions behind some convenient rocks and waited. The pirates attacking weren't stupid and had split up, flanking the group. In the ensuing chaos Squid took a bullet to the abdomen that destroyed one of her kidneys, and Dragon lost a toe.

The ostrich eggs hatched after a week and several adorable babies started running loose in the shack. Raven sensed an opportunity in them and spent several days carefully befriending a young male and female, hoping they might some day breed and provide more security in food. He made a critical error with another, though, and was overwhelmed by the flock of them. He fought valiantly, but was picked apart by half a dozen tiny beaks, one even permanently damaging his left eye as he collapsed to the floor. The other colonists had to rescue him and put down the remaining birds. They did eat well for the next couple days, at least... and Raven had his breeding pair.

Squid had unlocked the means to make bedding, and Dragon created pillowy soft beds for everyone... well, pillowy compared to the hard earth. A couple of the beds were lumpy and a little rickety, but still better than nothing. With this new understanding, too, he set about making the caves a little more homey and worked endlessly for days on minor improvements that lifted everyones' spirits. Despair had started to settle in and some minor fights were breaking out. Having a place to sit and eat, or a place to play Ur for an hour or two made a huge difference.

Winter came too soon, with a jarring Cold Snap that devastated the still-growing crops. Everyone rushed out to save what they could, but only about half could be harvested before they died and even those only provided a partial yield. Winter would be lean, but at least they could still hunt to survive as they had been raised to by the tribe. As soon as the cold ended, Penguin tried in vain to push through a new crop of rice. It didn't grow fast enough and was killed by the first snowfall.

As snow piled up outside, Squid taught Dragon how to make them all coats - which he set about with vigor. They had enough leather from hunting to give everyone a warm parka. Life was hard but they were going to make it. Raven brought in enough game to keep Jaguar in the tiny kitchen going strong. Penguin kept supplying them with firewood and fuel for the torches that helped keep their rooms warm and bright. They even captured a raider named Frankie, who shared their fascination with body modification, and managed to talk him into joining them. The growing ostriches were burdens on the food stocks, but Raven kept insisting they were worth it. He even trained one to hunt with him.

Then, a few days into winter, Ura happened.

They heard a girl screaming for help and rushed out to find her half-naked and staggering through the snow. She was just 16 and being chased by a band of 6 heavily armed pirates. They directed her to take refuge inside while they set up the defensive line. It was going to be a hard fight. Two of the raiders had heavy submachine guns. Two more had bolt-action rifles. The last two had swords they swung with maniac glee.

Frankie and Raven moved off behind the shack, hoping to lure the SMG wielders there and remove their range advantage, forcing them into melee. Raven's dual Power Claws should make short work of them as long as he can get close enough. The diversion worked beautifully, and while those two were engaged, the other four fought with the defensive line - and as soon as the melee raiders were cut down, they all tried to flee. The two rifles did manage to escape, but the group acquired two prestine Heavy SMG's to help offset the damage done and days they'd all need to rest and recover.

Ura, it turned out, was a wonderful girl who was more than willing to help out... but had been the victim of pirate experimentation, and was in the early stages of Luciferium withdrawl. There was absolutely nothing any of the others could do to ease her suffering. She was bound to die in a berserk bloodlust once the withdrawl hit its peak. A glimmer of hope came in an offer to provide us with a single dose of a miracle elixir, said to heal any injury - even to be able to grow back lost limbs. Raven and Jaguar jumped at the chance, picking up the SMG's and taking Ura with them so she could help.

The bandit camp was a clean sweep, easily plundered and the cure was found - but Ura had already begun randomly going into bloodlusting rages and Raven had to keep knocking her out. Upon finding the syringe, though, they looked closely at the directions and were crestfallen to see that while it could cure any physical harm, there was fine print advising that it did nothing for Luciferium toxicity (I did a little save-scum to see if it would cure it, and it didn't, so I loaded the game - too precious a thing to waste randomly).

Ura made it home with the group, but it was obvious that she didn't have long. In one of her last moments of clarity, she took off in the night and lost herself in a blizzard. She didn't want to keep hurting people, and knew her time was short. She died, alone and lost on the road - frothing in a blind rage. Despite her brief time with the tribe, her loss was mourned.

That's when things took a turn for the worse.

While everyone was in despair and tensions were running high, a toxic waste plume erupted over the horizon, blanketing the world in a sickly green glow. Anyone who went outside could feel the poisons seeping through their skin. Hair sloughed off in clumps if they went out too long. The colonists took turns hunting down the thinning wildlife so no one was overexposed.

Squid announced a breakthrough in Stonecutting, but the others just kicked dirt at her. Another raid hit, and they were able to muster the energy to overcome them - but only barely. Everyone was hurt in some way, except for Jaguar - who tried hard to keep people patched up and spent a lot of time wishing for food in the empty pantry.

As the toxic storm continued, wildlife died off completely. There wasn't even a rat or squirrel out there to hunt. The cold snap had decimated the crops that were going to become the winter larder. Tensions flared. Fights broke out. Several people wandered in dazes, threw pointless destructive tantrums, and started hitting each other. Stomachs emptied and everyone was starving - and winter had only just begun.

The group decided to slaughter all the livestock - amounting to three Alpacas and two Boomalopes. The latter were brought out behind the shed and shot at range so they wouldn't hurt anyone. Raven petitioned to keep his battle birds alive as they helped fight off raiders and bring down prey. He absolutely would not give up his birds and threatened to hurt anyone who tried to take them - and his Power Claws made a clear message of it.

The slaughter bought them a few days, but improved no moods. Days slipped by with the group in dire straits. Everyone was on a ragged edge, and the green clouds outside showed no signs of abating.

Late one night Penguin lapsed into a murderous rage. She stormed out of her room and was set to kill Dragon. Raven ran after her and subdued her, but she kept screaming about how wrong it was. How they should never have done it. She was completely mental, babbling. The group met to discuss it and to their collective horror they discovered that each of them had been slipping off in secret to gnaw on the dead raiders stored in a mass grave at the edge of the community. Hunger had driven them to complete insanity and cannibalism.

Jaguar made a hard call and asked the others to brave the toxic snow and bring the bodies inside. She told them that if they were going to survive, they were going to need to do more than chew the ragged strips of flesh off the rotting bodies. They should at least cook it properly. Everyone agreed, hanging their heads in shame, and dragged in the tainted bodies one by one, where Jaguar mechanically dismembered them and cooked them. They ate. Not well. Not happily. Miserably, in fact... but they survived.

A couple people lapsed into comas and had to be force-fed. Penguin ran screaming into the night after three days, having gone completely feral. Raven brought her back and locked her in her room - bringing her trays of "nummies" without telling her what it was. Frankie spent time with her each morning, trying to coax her back to sanity and the group.

Another raid came through, and with it, another chance to survive. Misery and horror didn't abate, but the hunger did.

Then one morning, with no warning, the green pall on the sky lifted. Small animals emerged from their burrows, followed by slightly larger predators. The group emerged from their cave, sunken eyes and pale skin burning in the light. The snow melted and plants started emerging.
Penguin was still lost inside her own mind, but at least they had survived the winter.

What a goddamn year.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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:shock: :clap:
It's almost as if people are the problem.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Unagi »

great story telling. keep sharing.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Freyland »

That story really put a damper on my dreams of being a pirate-slave escapee on an untamed primitive world.
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Paingod
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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Unagi wrote: Wed Nov 07, 2018 11:26 am great story telling. keep sharing.
I can try, but it really depends on what Cassandra throws at us. I've had whole seasons go quietly in other games ... which doesn't make for an interesting tale. That "victory" over winter was probably the worst one I've ever had. I've been down before, but never down to a point where my colonists were resorting to sneaking off undirected to nibble on human corpses.

Maybe the "Rough" setting really is?

If you want to see the map I'm working with in real life, the seed was mechanism, the map was spawned with 100% coverage, and the location is 39.90ºS, 4.67ºE - it has mountains, an asphalt road, a creek, and no caves. The native stones are slate and limestone, and there's a 30/60 growing cycle.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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With the coming of spring, hope was in the air. Everyone that could move set out immediately to start hunting small game, and in that first day they scraped together enough rat and squirrel to hold them over. Penguin remained virtually catatonic, feral, and refused to move from her bed. Jaguar and Frankie tried to coax her back to reality, but the horrors of the winter were too fresh in her mind.

When Raven took down the first large game animal of the winter, a small Buck deer, the group celebrated quietly in the spartan common room. Half-chiseled walls and a rough hewn floor seemed a fitting setting for the group and they held a quick, quiet prayer for themselves. They didn't pity the raiders they fought, but felt like they had lost something in themselves and wanted to find a way back. Jaguar did her best to make the venison special, and it didn't take much - just knowing their steaks never had names was enough.

A lone wanderer passed by late in the evening, mud caked on his bare feet. They offered him a place to stay the night be he declined - saying he had barely survived escaping a small encampment in the west. The bandits there had descended on each other in the winter, and few had survived - those that did went their own way with what little they could carry. He was sure that there might be something of value left behind if they wanted to go look for it. He had no interest in staying and just wanted to get home. Dragon and Jaguar set out the next morning. The encampment was a day's travel and they packed light. Just enough food to survive and the two SMG's. If it turned sour, they wanted to be able to run quickly.

While they were gone, Squid resumed researching. She was close to a breakthrough in Electricity, and announced it before they returned. She started in on water generators, with ideas for batteries afterwards.

When Dragon and Jaguar arrived, it was apparent that the bandits hadn't left much behind. A couple small shacks, a solar panel, and some ratty sandbags were all they saw. Wary of danger, they moved up cautiously, and rightly so. Before they could get to the first shack, three haggard bandits with knives ran at them from the surrounding woods, surrounding them. They looked feral and mad with hunger. They didn't stand much of a chance against the machine guns, though, and were cut down before they could even swing their blades.

Inside the camp, they found evidence of violence - blood, gore, scraps of clothing. Under a flipped bed, Jaguar found a small electronic beacon - which, upon closer examination, turned out to be an Orbital Bombardment Trigger. Who were these people before they were driven insane by the winter? They also found a boxed up Infinite Chemreactor. As the manual described it, a device capable of pulling chemicals out of the ambient atmosphere and condensing them into usable chemfuel. They boggled at it, but gathered it up - almost too heavy by itself for them to bring home - and left after salvaging a couple components from the Solar Panel. There was nothing else there for anyone.

The trip home was uneventful and quick. When they got back, Dragon installed the Chemreactor and built a Chemfuel Generator next to it. A perfect pairing, he thought. Now they just needed some lights - so he set about making them. The generator's warmth filled the hallways and helped make the stone feel less harsh and uninviting, combating the cold air still outside.

Squid caught Raven slipping off to the store room to try and medicate himself with the Smokeweed bundles they had found on one of the raiders, which he had secretly grown dependent on. He explained that it was the only way be could function - possibly the only reason he hadn't gone completely mad yet - but she was able to talk him into burning the rest of it. The group needed him alert and aware, not half asleep and useless. Over the next few days they formed a stronger bond and moved in together, sharing a large double bed Dragon put together for them.

Dragon and Jaguar also bonded, often taking breaks in the dining hall, sitting quietly together, comforting each other. The winter had brought them all closer together as survivors. Frankie spent more time talking to Penguin. He didn't push, but could tell she was still in there. Dragon spent time in the evenings working on new, larger beds for every room. A treat, he said, that they all deserved. Wood was one of the few things not in short supply, and they could spare it.

As soon as the weather turned warm enough, everyone but Penguin spent two entire days tilling the soil and planting their first crops - looking forward to rice, corn, potatoes, strawberries - and even some cotton and healroot to replenish the stores. They felt a sense of renewed purpose with their hands covered in dirt instead of blood, with the sun on their backs instead of stone overhead. They felt alive again. Haunted by grim reminders from time to time, though. No one wanted to deal with the small pile of rotting clothing behind the shed, knowing where it came from. Worse yet, they had a small pile of a very different kind of leather that no one wanted to move; it had only been saved because no one knew what they may need to survive.

Raven, wracked with withdrawl pains, did his best to keep hunting and working with his ostriches. He was beginning to doubt their usefulness. They were fast - very fast - but dumb. He couldn't get them to carry anything without them screeching and running in circles. He'd seen trained Wargs in combat, dragging the wounded off the field. They seemed more adapted to the life they were leading now ... No. He'd keep on trying with the birds. They had helped him, and they were at least easy to feed and maintain. Alpacas showed up, and he tamed most of them, restoring the small herd they had to sacrifice last year.

Dragon continued creating more furnishings, hauling wood, tending the garden, and putting together clothing from animal hides. He seemed resilient, and eager to get on with life. The others, too, were happy again - a return to normalcy. Sunlight, farming - basic things, but welcome. Frankie spent a lot of time trying to learn how to tend the crops. When he had joined, plants were where he got sticks to hit people with, but he knew little else. Now he had a fledgling interest in them, though often crushed them as much as he cared for them.

A quiet week went by - a single, solitary flash storm hit. It burned the forests for a little while before rains put the blaze out.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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The first caravan of the year arrived just after they harvested the first crop of rice. Traders, they called themselves, but they were little more than slavers. Sorting through their stock, Jaguar found Luciferium - enough that it might have kept Ura alive for months. She also found that they had three humans, branded but "in otherwise good condition" for sale. Disgusted, she refused to even look at their other wares and sent them on. The trader spat at her feet and told her that when things get hard, there isn't anyone who won't do whatever it takes to get by. She wondered if he knew. Had one of his handlers seen the skins buried in the back of the store room? Oh, gods, she hoped not.

With veggies from the gardens, and meat from hunting, Jaguar stepped up her cooking and started putting out better meals. Eating something other than meat with sides of meat and meat for dessert was quite satisfying for the group. The birds, too, got their fill fresh from the fields. The most amazing thing, though, was that this nudge seemed to be what Penguin had been waiting for. After her first non-meat meal, she actually got up and started moving around her room a little. She was still lost and wandered in small circles, but everyone was encouraged by this improvement. Frankie redoubled his efforts to visit her morning and night.

On the 2nd of Aprimay, while he was bent over in the field dry-heaving from withdrawl pains, Raven found a solitary ostrich egg partially buried in the grass and brought it inside to keep it safe. He had set it down in his room, thinking it would be warm and safe enough there. His birds were breeding! He didn't tell anyone else, wanting to keep it as a secret surprise for later.

The next day, Squid announced that she had drawn up plans for a cooling system that should help preserve foods for the winter safely. They had all seen these units in the pirate bases and knew how useful it would be. Dragon didn't waste a moment building the unit into the wall on their larder, and within hours the room had a light layer of frost forming on the walls. This seemed like a huge milestone - no more wasted food to spoilage, being able to store game animals whole and preserve them for later use. Even frozen vegetables would keep well.

The few days that went by were quiet, with the big event being chunks of space debris crashing in the forest outside their valley. Raven was up to 7 tamed Alpacas and two more Boomalopes. Squid asked Frankie to stop accidentally ripping up plants and instead spend more time cleaning. He didn't much care for it, but agreed that while everyone else was really busy he should help somehow. Outside of hitting people and articulating clearly, he really didn't have any appreciable skills.

One of the groups passing through along the road mentioned they had seen another abandoned encampment a day's jounrey back, but didn't feel curious enough to check on it. Jaguar and Dragon set out that evening, bringing a few Alpacas this time and more food than they needed in case they found someone in distress. Several miles outside their home, a single lunatic set upon them - running up the road, screaming, and waving a gun at them. He was too far away to be any kind of danger to them, but was clearly intent on trying. They looked at each other, sighed, and sat down behind trees on the side of the road to wait for him. Jaguar screamed for him to stop before he got into firing range, warning him that they'd have to shoot if he did. Dragon fired a single volley short into the dirt to punctuate her demand - but the maniac didn't even slow down. They both lined up their sights and fired. The gun was in good condition, but the man was clearly mad. He had painted himself with something that looked like a mix of megasloth droppings and boomalope oil. The combination would have been a toxic, explosive mess if he had found a way to ignite himself.

The encampment was where the refugees had said it would be, but was just a single shed, surrounded by sandbags and a solar panel. No one was present. Feeling a sense of deja-vu, they walked up cautiously, looking for the ambush. Dragon started saying something about his stomach hurting, but didn't finish saying it before projectile vomit erupted from his mouth and he doubled over in agony. Almost as if this was the cue they were waiting for, two brigands burst out of a nearby cave and charged.

Jaguar tried to help Dragon get to cover, but he waved her off and feebly lifted his gun while wretching, firing wide and uselessly. The volley only seemed to encourage the bandits as they ran towards them. He crawled over to a tree while Jaguar dove behind a rock. She managed to clip one of the brigands, the one charging with a club, before he got to her and slammed her so hard that she heard her arm crack. The other one had a machine pistol and was peppering the ground around the tree with small caliber rounds. Dragon was hit by ricochets and debris, suffering several small lacerations but no real harm. He tried to return fire, but found his vomit covered hands slipped on his SMG uselessly when he pulled the trigger and he had to pick it back up.

Jaguar was no match for the bandit pressing her, and he repeatedly beat her down, slamming her against the rock with his club. She fought valiantly, but was overmatched. She had delivered several brusing hits with the butt of her SMG, and even bit the raider's leg - but he was undeterred and raised his club to finish her off. The only thought she had as it was about to come down was "Is that Granite? Am I about to be killed with a stick-shaped rock?" She cringed, closing her eyes - and heard a zinging noise, followed by warm, wet rain. When she opened her eyes, she saw that Dragon had managed to get his gun and rolled to unload it over her head, catching the bastard in the left eye and creating a huge, gory crater where his skull should have been.

Dragon wasn't doing too good himself, having been directly hit several times by the light caliber bullets being sprayed at him. Just after he saved Jaguar, he collapsed again and started vomiting. If he survived this, he vowed was going to have a talk with Squid about her turns in the kitchen, and how well she kept the cooking area clean. He passed out, flopping into a pool of his own blood and bile. He wasn't aware of the bullets bouncing off the trees and rocks around him.

Jaguar staggered over to a rock wall and braced herself behind it, mostly to stay standing up, but also to help her aim at the last ambusher. He was cackling with glee and didn't even seem to notice her aiming at him. Only when she pulled the trigger and two of her bullets ripped through his arm and leg did he look her way, and by the time he switched hands and lifted the little gun her way again, she had finished him with another spray of bullets.

She took stock of herself - badly bruised and bleeding, but not in any immediate danger. She ran to the Alpacas - which had been idly grazing during the gunfight, and ripped apart three satchels looking for medical supplies. Dragon was the priority, and she could tell he was in a bad way. When she got back to him, he was oozing out of several holes and his pulse was weak. She patched him quickly, stopping the bloodflow and hoping the healing properties of the plant would do the rest. She'd seen it heal even severe injuries without even leaving a scar. As long as she could stop the bleeding, he should survive. The vomit, though, was his problem. She left him on his side and made sure the bandits were really dead, peppering each with a quick spray of bullets. Satisfied, she returned to collect more herbs and patched herself up.

At home, everything was quiet. No raids, no toxic clouds, no rampaging hoards of squirrels. No one knew what Jaguar and Dragon were up to, but they knew they should be on the way home by now.
Last edited by Paingod on Thu Nov 08, 2018 1:06 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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The next day, Frankie sat with Penguin again and this time she looked up at him and said "Thank you" ... and he almost fell out of his chair with surprise. She shuffled out of her room and greeted the group, almost as though she had never known them. They welcomed her back, and to celebrate her return from darkness, she spent the next two days outside in the sun, tending the earth she loved so dearly. Frankie was there, ripping out weeds and potato plants equally, and she felt good. For the first time in months, she felt like herself again.

That night they heard strange noises in the woods and when Raven went to check it out, he found three raiders with clubs running from a mad Alpaca. He wasn't sure what they had done to it, but they were coming right for the door with it on their heels. He roused the group and they took down all four problems with relative ease. The alpaca would be put to use in the kitchen and the raiders were put out to rot.

Back at the shed.

Jaguar wasn't sure if she should check it or leave it. To be on the safe side, she gathered up Dragon and tied him to one of the Alpacas - stuffing his gun and the other weapons into satchels to keep them safe. She made her way to the door and eased it open quietly. There was no movement, no sound, and no feeling that there was anything left alive. She found a mess inside, and a couple storage crates. Making sure no one was around, she dragged the crates out and tossed them, looking for anything of value.

Inside the first, she found a pile of cupie dolls and sock monkeys, but didn't think there was anything of value in that. The second crate was filled with old water filter control chips that she tossed aside, and in a box in the bottom she discovered an Orbital Bombardment Trigger. Had she brought one and put it in here? No. No way. She carefully packed it up and stuck it in a bag on the Alpacas. The third crate contained an Infinite Chemreactor, still in shrink wrap. Feeling a little lightheaded, she sat down and stared at it for a few minutes before hefting the parts up onto the Alpacas and strapping it all down. Coincidence was one thing, but this was pushing it. What were the odds, she wondered, of the same two people finding the same two pairs of potent items in two abandoned ambush sites.

They started off on the long walk home with Dragon lolling in and out of consciousness. She had to tie him down to keep him from toppling over. He came to just once and she told him about what they had found. He responded by vomiting violently one last time and passing out again.

Aprimay 9th ... So, of course, it all had to go wrong.

They all awoke the next morning to Penguin screaming. "No! No!! NOOO! NOOOOOO!" she raved as she ran through the base. Everyone got up and quickly ran outside, and immediately ran back inside. Overnight the temperatures had plummeted and a quarter of their plants had already died. They dressed quickly and rushed out to save what they could, but it was fiercely, bitingly cold. Plants were dying in droves. They worked rapidly, but ineffectively. The cold was simply too powerful.

Before they could get what little they salvaged inside, Frankie felt a sharp, intense pain in his calf and looked down to find a hare latched onto his leg. He beat at it furiously, and killed it with ease. He turned around to find 6 more coming for him and he ran without thought. The rabbits swarmed over the unprepared colonists, biting and scratching. They died easily, but there was too much confusion to kill them quickly and several people were bitten multiple times, scattering drops of blood on the frost-covered earth.

Jaguar and Dragon arrived near the end of the day, exhausted. They knew the frost had come early, and found the fields empty except for spatters of blood. Jaguar helped patch up what Squid didn't have time to get to yet. Penguin was in bad shape. She had been standing next to Frankie when he was attacked, and had been overcome with shock and unable to defend herself when the rabbits started biting her. Two of the nastier bites were clearly developing infections. She was on the verge of cracking.

Dragon did a quick check of the pantry and knew the math would never add up. He flew into a rage at the futility of it all and stormed outside, grabbing two Alpacas and slaughtering them against Raven's protests. He would NOT endure another winter like the last one. He swore at Raven until spittle glazed into a crust on his beard. Squid separated them, telling everyone that they'd have to deal with it in the morning.

A messenger arrived for Jaguar late that night. He handed over a note, which simply asked if they were willing to sell any of that special leather they had in the back of the store room. He was looking for 530 units of the stuff. She shredded the note in disgust and asked Raven to move it all out to the burial pits so it could rot and they could be rid of it.

They awoke early and set to cleaning up the last of the goods outside. It was clear that Penguin was in no condition to work and Jaguar confined her t bed rest. They stepped outside to find that a herd of wild boars had come in and started devouring all the remaining crops they hadn't brought in. No one had ever seen so many - and the boars were ravenous. Knowing these things could be volatile, they formed up back to back and Raven called out which they should all fire at. They took down a dozen of them, and the others scattered - but were hunted quickly. They found a lot of herbivores were coming to the farm to pick over the remaining crops, and they killed everything they saw. Megasloths, rabbits, ibex, rats, quirrels, boars, a few deer, and even a cougar. It took them three whole days to hunt everything.

Between this insane hunt and Penguin's increasing fevers, Frankie snapped. He started wandering aimlessly through the empty fields. No one could convince him to come in, so they left him to his own ends and simply kept an eye on him. A day later, when he came back inside, he was hypothermic and shivering uncontrolably - but promised he felt much better. Penguin, too, broke her fever and joined the group for dinner that night.

They had dozens of animals stacked up for winter now, as well as some of their crops. As long as the freezer didn't break down, Dragon said after tallying everything, they should be fine. If it did break down, though, they'd be screwed. He didn't have even a single spare part to fix it. A light murmur went through the group and Squid, the least banged up on the bunsh so far, offered to head out the next day to a nearby town to look for parts. Everyone agreed and turned in.

In the middle of that night, during his watch, Raven found a woman running wildly up the ice-covered road east of their home. She called herself Ricky, and she begged for sanctuary, explaining that a band of tribals wanted to kill her and wear her breasts like hats. Raven was doubtful - not even the best fertility charms called for that sort of thing - but did see a mob of angry spears and bows coming in. He sent Ricky ahead to the colony and told her to rouse the rest while he tried to talk to the attackers.

Raven met the persuers at the valley entrance, but the tribals had no patience for parley and started their retort with arrows. He ran back and met the others at the battle line. It wasn't going to be pretty. They clearly had the tribals outgunned, but they were still outnumbered by the invaders. Ricky had even joined them after finding an old bow in the store room. The fight played out quickly and painfully against the tribals, with a few escaping and vowing revenge. Ricky insisted she had no idea why they wanted her dead.

Things stayed quiet for a while, too. Winter dragged on and the remaining animals went into hibernation.
Last edited by Paingod on Fri Nov 09, 2018 9:46 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Unagi »

:pop:

I love some of the last second heroic stuff that can go down in RW games. Great descriptions!


Did you really find the Orbital Bombardment Trigger and Infinite Chemreactor twice? or just a slip in note taking?
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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:coffee:
It's almost as if people are the problem.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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Unagi wrote: Thu Nov 08, 2018 1:26 pmDid you really find the Orbital Bombardment Trigger and Infinite Chemreactor twice? or just a slip in note taking?
Literally twice. Two basically identical missions, with the exact same reward for each. I've got something like 160 hours in this game, and I've never seen either of those items before this world. Maybe they only spawn for Rough settings? The Trigger looks like something to save for really late-game - so I can basically say "Hey, that's a nice Siege you had there. I don't really want to deal with it" and make it go away.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Unagi »

Or on a road-trip attack, for a big boost to fire-power.


Also; I have (holy cow, just checked!) 1,601 hours in Rim World (almost all with infestations off) - and I've never once seen/used those two object either. Pretty sure I recall the bombardment one added fairly recently - and I believe there are a number of items that one can only get while off on a quest.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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Jaguar and Penguin kept the kitchens humming, efficiently butchering and prepping in shifts so there was always a warm meal. Squid was eager to help, but ultimately returned to her research lab when everyone reminded her that her cooking tended to make people violently ill. Ricky turned out to be a warm, welcome addition. She was a kind soul that put everyone at ease when they talked with her. She spent some time learning the basics of construction as an apprentice to Dragon and together they continued to remodel the interior of the caves to resemble more of a fallout shelter than an abandoned mine. Raven continued hunting, bringing in whatever he could find for foraging animals, and Frankie spent time hauling rocks around the valley for future use as building materials.

When the generator's steady hum came to a grinding, shuddering halt it woke everyone up. The only thing they had powering the base now was a small watermill that Dragon had set up in the creek late last year as a test. It barely met their needs and they had to disconnect several lights and a couple heaters just to keep the freezer operating. Without the heat created by the generator, the hallways and common rooms became cold and uninviting. Dragon turned over the warehouse twice searching for anything he could use to fix the generator, ultimately deciding to leave it off and not disassemble something else to scavenge the parts he needed unless it became absolutely essential.

Before Raven took off to hunt each morning, he tried to work with his battle birds - but as the winter wore on, they became increasingly agitated. He had nothing in the stores that they found motivating and could only get them to choke down the grilled meat. He worried that they would soon go feral and he'd have no way to retrain them. A few days prior he had found a second egg in a corner of the base and put it with the first. When he went to go check on them, he discovered they were gone and that Frankie had moved them to the warehouse, not thinking about what they were. He was irate and disheartened. With the generator offline, the temperature in there had plunged and the eggs died. They would never hatch. Heartbroken, he decided to turn his birds lose. He brought them outside one morning and as soon as they were past the door they took off at full speed without ever looking back.

After the winter solstice, things started looking up.

A large trade caravan came by one morning when the snow let up, laden with mountains of common goods - and willing to purchase the vast stores of leathers and old clothes they had accumulated over the year. Dragon cleaned out their stocks of random components, immediately fixing the generator and getting the base warmed up again. Penguin bought out their store of rice grains, setting aside some to till the fields and putting the rest in the freezer for meals.

The next day, while Raven was out hunting, he found a small band of raiders attempting to carve their way through the natural cliffside that protected the valley. He rallied the others and together they snuck up behind the invaders. With their focus on digging through the rocks, they hadn't noticed the defensive line forming behind them and the colonists turned the tunnel into a shooting gallery. Bullets ricocheted down the tunnel, annihilating all of the raiders. Not a one survived, and none of the colonists sustained even a scratch. They did almost manage to dig through the natural barrier, though, and Dragon would need to backfill it with stones to restore the defensive value of it. That would mean setting up a stonecutting station - and Ricky was eager to help with it.

A few days later, another trade caravan was winding its way through the valley and was beset by hungry Wargs. The guards beat off the attack, but a couple of them were badly hurt, one of the Muffalos was ripped up but alive, and a camel was on the verge of death by the time they stopped to negotiate prices. Jaguar offered to patch people up, and the caravan leader refused. He wouldn't even let her tend the bleeding livestock, insisting they'd heal up just fine. He did look over the camel and offered to sell it to Jaguar for a pittance. She agreed, buying it and its mate at a deeply discounted rate. It didn't take her more than an hour to patch up the holes and get it resting to heal. Aside from the animals, Raven splurged on a finely made Sniper rifle and Frankie found a battered steel mace, trading in his chipped gladius. Jaguar picked up several name brand medical kits, tucking them away under a pile of straw where no one could easily see them - she didn't want anyone wasting that on scratches and bruises. Squid haggled at length to get a bionic animal brain and bionic animal lung "for future research purposes".

As the merchant packed up to leave, the wounded Muffalo lagged behind, ultimately collapsing on the ground, spilling the contents of the bags it carried everywhere. The marchant never even turned around and was gone before anyone could catch him. Jaguar patched up the poor beast, and everyone decided that it was better to store the goods than to let them rot. If the merchant was so careless, they wouldn't feel badly about taking what he left behind. They found several nice articles of clothing that none of them would have ever spent money on, as well as a well crafted Hyperweave recliner that they all argued over. The chair was ultimately placed in the research lab, with Squid arguing that she spent the most time sitting, so it made sense for her to have it. When the Muffalo was able to walk again, it raced off after the uncaring salesman.

Their good fortune didn't last, though. Two days later a screaming noise rent the sky and they looked up to watch two pods crash over the horizon. Raven went to investigate and came running back. Synths. Two synths had landed and were headed their way. They had all seen what Synths could do while they were slaves to the pirates and knew how dangerous they could be. Frankie and Ricky shrugged it off as no big deal. There were seven of them and only two Synths.

They lined up for defense behind mounds of rocks and waited. The Synths moved with an eerie grace, almost flowing over the ground. Frankie was hiding in the shed, waiting to run up behind them. As soon as he saw them, Raven started lining up shot after shot with the rifle, but all he could seem to do was graze them. To the groups' horror, the Synths stopped in unison and raised their charge rifles - well out of range of everyone except Raven, and he wasn't going to stop them by himself. As plasma shots plugged into the rocks around them, Raven hit his walkie-talkie and asked Frankie if he was willing to create a diversion and run around behind them. He'd try, he said.

Frankie ran at the shed door, kicking it open and charging towards the Synths. One of them rotated and took aim at him, neatly searing a hole in his left arm as he came on. The others ran forward, trying to get close enough to fire back. There was absolutely no cover out here, and none of them wanted to stand in the open facing plasma fire. They lined up as quickly as they could and concentrated their shots on the Synth Frankie had distracted. They watched in horror as it flipped it's gun inside out and started hacking at Frankie with plasteel scythes. He wasn't going to last long against that.

Frankie, though, had been a star knight in training before finding himself here and deftly dodged most of the Synth's swings, letting a few passing hits land so he could smash his mace into the thing's head. He feinted and brought his mace up, crushing the torso and setting the unit off balance as several SMG rounds ripped through the processing core. It spattered him with a mix of oil and blue conductive fluid as it spun uncontrollably and collapsed. He was bleeding badly, but ran at the other one to continue his assault.

It was over quickly. Several arrows and bullets tattered the remaining Synth hull, and by the time Frankie reached it, he had to only smash it a couple times to knock it down. It hadn't even attempted to pull out it's scythes and fell awkwardly to the side in a rigid pose, arms outstretched and twitching.

Everyone cheered, and Jaguar ran to get her new medical kit. Frankie staggered to his bedroom, waving off offers of assistance, while the others tended their own injuries. All told, they had a few burns and holes - but nothing serious. Frankie, though, was bleeding badly and by the time Jaguar got back to him he had soaked blood through his bed and passed out. She deftly stitched and patched, scraping off charred flesh and closing the heinous gashes left by the Synth blades. When she finished, even she was impressed by how well she had put him back together. He'd heal quickly and completely.

After the Synth attack, Dragon asked Squid to stop looking into ways to grow plants inside and instead focus on helping him design some kind of armor that could help Frankie survive another melee confrontation like that without coming out looking like he had run through a paper shredder. Her brain itched at the concept of putting her project on hold before it was complete, but she agreed. He was able, too, to put together a small ham radio set using scraps from the Synths and his electronics piles, and found someone asking anyone in the area to deal with a small pirate outpost for a modest reward, including an Oribital Bomdardment Trigger.

Life continued quietly after that. Spring arrived and the snows started melting. Larger animals came back to graze and hunt, and Raven managed to tame two members of a pack of Wargs that passed through, following their migrating prey. He'd have to start all over - but at least these beasts loved meat and would remain trainable through the long winter months.

The survivors looked forward to planting crops tomorrow, the beginning of the growing season. Things were looking bright. They had a breeding pair of Dromedaries, the best pack animals money could buy - as well as a number of Alpacas and a breeding pair of Wargs.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Paingod »

I think I need to work less directly with notes (I get too verbose) and do more simple recall on what happened that night (more streamlined, interesting).
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Cylus Maxii »

I'm finding it very interesting. But feel free to change anything if it keeps it fun and keeps the AAR going! :pop:
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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I left my notes at home today - but I had a weekend of play and it'd take a long time to put together. I'm probably hopelessly behind now, and trying to catch up would take more time than I have to spare at work. I'm going to have to cut it short ... :hawk:

I do like that the game tells a story, and am enjoying watching it unfold. The quick and dirty summary on where we are now ...

Winters are tough. Even knowing what's coming down the road, I have trouble prepping for them. My mountain base has weaknesses - a couple infestations have finally hit (and I haven't worked out a good way to use the Infestation Bait mod). Thankfully, both landed inside my food stores, and didn't get to destroy anything of value. I did get to turn my hallways into shooting galleries to clean them up. The last winter I made it through ended with herbivore starvation because I ran out of plant matter and kibble - and I wasn't letting them eat the rations for the colonists or the meat for the Wargs. What I wasn't counting on was a chain-reaction of three Boomalopes passing out in the animal pens. After that I took the rest out to a pasture and finished them off. Now I'm back to having a few of them - they make good money in Chemfuel -but are hazardous to keep inside.

I don't know if the animal cybernetics mod does something to loot/sales tables - but I find animal mods for sale at about a 10 to 1 ratio over human cybernetics. Hunting for parts to put into my Transhumanists is getting a little tedious, and the few parts I do find are the Archotech advanced parts, and about 3x as expensive as regular bionics. I have experimented heavily with one of my yearling Wargs - and the thing is a monster. An average Warg runs at 5.00 cells per second and bites for 5.6dps with 21% armor piercing. The drastically modified Warg has a movement of 9.3 cells per second, and bites for over 9dps with 28% armor piercing. He would sell for about $4,000 on the open market instead of $350. He doesn't have any battle armor mods installed and gets banged up as the first into most fights. He's had legs, jaw, spine, stomach, and one eye replaced with normal Bionics - and an Archotech animal brain installed.

I've been stockpiling Advanced Parts to make my own Bionics, though, and am a few research projects away from that. I think all my Transhumanists will get new Legs before anything else, except for a couple with crippling alternate injuries - like Dragon, who's spine was permanently cracked by LMG fire. In the normal course of events, we've lost a couple legs that I'd replaced with Prosthetics - and a hand (also on Dragon) was swapped with with a Power Claw.

Enemies seem to rely on Sapper attacks at a staggering rate. I've taken to backfilling their tunnels a little and then piling up traps for them to step on when they go through. Takes a lot of wood, though. Sometimes sappers come in with one or two grenade throwers - and when those die, the rest walk around the map to get to my killbox. That's rare, though. Most often, the group gets through and then gets chewed up by my defenses. One sapper group was entirely grenade throwers. That was a scary encounter.

Frankie died. Despite having him in full plate and an advanced helmet, he managed to get ripped up badly during one Merc raid. He sustained so many bullets before falling over that I couldn't get him to medical before he bled out. Jaguar tried to rescue him during the firefight, but she ended up getting knocked out when she broke cover.

I have four operational Infinite Chemfuel plants, and four Chem Generators. The heat they throw off is vented harmlessly outside year-round, but enough the ambient heat passes through the door to the interior hallway and keeps the main halls a toasty 80ºF. Blocked off the residential areas, and I never need heaters. Even cold snap -20ºF temps don't penetrate into the base... and if there ever was a chill, I'd just need to close the generator room's exterior door and open the internal one for a little while.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Paingod »

So the game determines your colony value - I'm assuming an aggregate of the cost for everything (from pets to colonists to weapons to furnishings) - to spend points buying raids. A high value colony equates to high value raids. Lots of guys with assault rifles, sniper rifles, bolt action rifles, and even one or two with rocket launchers.

I had such a raid last night. It was a staggering enemy force. They stopped to prep before attacking, and I picked off a couple... but it was barely a dent.

Moments before they attacked, a woman called in asking for help - a gaggle of tribals were chasing her. Sure. Why not. Let's see what happens.

It was glorious. Just as I tied up the ~20 Mercs with my defensive line, a massive force of something like 30 tribals slammed into their back-end. Complete chaos.

I think I need to get that "Sometimes Raids Go Wrong" mod now. It was too damn funny. Plus, I got a few free assault rifles, sniper rifles, bolt actions, and a triple rocket launcher - all in "like new" condition.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Paingod »

That "Sometimes Raids Go Wrong" mod doesn't look like it was updated to 1.0. I've never seen so many 'abandoned' mods as I see for this game. It seems like half of them are updated by second or third parties that liked them and just want them to stay alive, providing credit to the originator.

I did cave in and get a "Stack Size" mod - everything is multiplied by 10. I was getting annoyed with having a HUGE store room that still wasn't enough space because everything stacks at 75 units. Mostly my food stores were giving me headaches.

I stripped down my cyborg Warg and put the components in a box. I didn't see it as murder since the brain was saved and it'll live again in a new body.

While they've been helpful against some things, they eat a -lot- of meat and it can be hard to come by during the long winter months. I also seem to have trouble controlling their populations after a certain point. So food availability coupled with rampant breeding makes them a little ... tenuous. I had sent my handler out on a set of missions and trading, and half way through his trek I realized his pets were getting dangerously close to feral. I set up a secondary handler, but he wasn't good enough fast enough to handle Wargs... and as a result, two went feral and I finally saw a message warning me that one of my colonists was being hunted for food. That was the last straw and I sold off the rest as quickly as I could.

I've swapped up to Rhino's, and have two females and a male now. The male is past the normal life expectancy, so I'm hoping he sires a viable male soon to continue to program. Even if they go feral, they won't start killing my people for sport.

The plan, as soon as the youngest Rhino hits maturity, is to install the full battle regalia. 4 legs, brain, spine, jaw, and neck/body armor. I'm very curious to see what a fully realized cybernetic Rhino in its prime can do. I know they're already huge meat shields, but they also start with slightly higher armor piercing than Wargs with the same raw damage potential and speed.

I sometimes see a Thrumbo come though and think about wanting to tame it, but remember that the things eat 500% more food than anything else and the best I'll have is a 2% chance to tame it at 20 skill. Maybe once I get my colony to a very stable point with a lot of excess farmland product... but not yet.

I'm still having huge issues finding good human bionics, though. The colony is working on the last stages of research to make them and has enough Advanced Components and Components stockpiled to make 10-13 different bionic components. I already need three arms and two legs to replace some prosthetics - and would like bionic stomachs to help skip over gut worms and food poisoning problems... so that might be all I do up front. :?
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Unagi »

for animal husbandry population control, I tend to make different animal zones... specifically I lock up the 1 or 2 males that I keep in smaller barns/ backyards.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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I keep trying to have 10 combat-trained animals, and let them breed as often as they choose to - then sell the offspring when they mature. Problem is, with Wargs, that's like 20+ animals at once. They have litters of two pups. It was okay as long as I could sustain it - my animal trainer got crazy skill gains and I never really fretted about losing one or two in a raid. There's good money in it - but you either have to luck out with an interested trader coming to your base - or you've got to pack up hundreds of fresh meat and walk them to a town. If they starve on the way, their value is ruined.

Rhinos are proving a little easier. They seem to breed slower and take longer to mature. I won't mind having maybe 6 of them in total instead of 20 Wargs. Be less expensive to outfit them for combat with cybernetics, too.

Fun fact: If your cybernetic animal has a bionic stomach and a bionic brain, you've got to choose which to salvage. Probably the same if it has two bionic lungs... likely can't remove both without killing it.

My mountain base hasn't even been fully established yet (I'm 4 years in and still don't have a proper prison or medical ward), but one of my design goals is to carve out a substantial kennel area for animals. I do like keeping them out of the house proper and keeping the food they eat - now just kibble and hay - out in a separate storage pen for them.

For some reason it never occurred to me to keep the males and females apart. :P

One thing I forgot to note was how cool EMP grenades are against Synths. I had a ship crash right inside my corn fields, and I set up a defensive line with two grenadiers within lobbing distance. I had them throw grenades and then hit the ship with a quick burst of gunfire. When the Synths popped out, most of them were immediately stunned by the grenades that popped a second later and simply stayed stunned through the fight. I've never used EMP grenades before, and now I'm thinking I need to always keep a couple on hand. Reduced 6 Synths to harmless mannequins. :dance:
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Unagi »

If you didn't witness it in your recent battle, they will develop a resistance to the stun after they are hit with enough of them. (So don't over apply if you can avoid it)


total aside: If you don't have a problem with mods, check out the Psychology mod.
I also like the 'more vanilla turrets' mod, if you've not seen that one.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Paingod »

Unagi wrote: Wed Nov 14, 2018 4:58 pmtotal aside: If you don't have a problem with mods, check out the Psychology mod.
I also like the 'more vanilla turrets' mod, if you've not seen that one.
I saw Psychology and considered it. I'll have to look more closely at it. I haven't looked into More Turrets, though. I tend to avoid "item" mods since they often overpower in some aspect. I've been running light on turrets since reading that they count more heavily in Raid points than a regular colonist does. I don't know how current that info is - there's so much data on this game and most of it is from somewhere along the 5 year development course, and not just related to 1.0.
Unagi wrote: Wed Nov 14, 2018 4:58 pmIf you didn't witness it in your recent battle, they will develop a resistance to the stun after they are hit with enough of them. (So don't over apply if you can avoid it)
I did see them develop immunity, but that only seemed to last a short while and they'd be stunned again. I suppose I was so EMP-happy that I wasn't considering a more nuanced application. Up until that particular fight, I'd always gone toe-to-toe with Synths, often at the loss of a limb or two. I was mostly excited to not be in the same scenario again, and didn't even consider the immunity an issue.

Something I noticed the other night when playing... I believe that "Hard Worker" or "Industrious" makes research faster, which is nice... but I also think "Quick Sleeper" makes healing infections quicker. I had two people laying side by side in a bunk, resting - and both got infections. The one with "Quick Sleeper" seemed to heal her infection much quicker than the other one, despite both getting roughly equal medical care (90-100% medical treatment with real medkits) ... is it possible that "Resting Faster" also equates to "Healing Quicker While Resting" ... ? Maybe it was a random fluke.

I try and keep my colonists on general bedrest if they're sick with plague, flu, or infections. I had read that resting speeds up immunity gain.

*Edit: You got me looking through mods again, and I found the updated 1.0 version of Sometimes Raids go Wrong. I'm itching to give this a whirl. I don't have an issue with the vanilla raid system, but after having a group of Mercs rear-ended by a group of Tribals via two perfectly timed normal events, I just want a little more random chaos.
Unagi wrote: Wed Nov 14, 2018 4:58 pmPsychology mod.
I was looking more into this and had a couple questions if you're using it. It seems like there may be some bugs with things like dates - have you ever seen that as an issue? A number of other comments mention issues with Mayors going insane because of everyone complaining to them. Have you had issues around that?

Still - it looks neat. I don't particularly want to have to start all over from scratch, so when I try if it doesn't mesh directly into an existing save, I plan to recreate my current crew - warts and all - using "Prepare Carefully" so I don't feel like I've lost dozens of hours of progress with them.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Unagi »

another mod suggestion:

"Shoo" allows you to mark an animal (much like tagging them for Hunt or Train) with "Shoo" , and a colonist will scare the animal away. Great for getting that pesky bomrat out of base, etc.

I just stumbled on this mod, and had to share.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Paingod »

"Shoo" sounds cute, but I just watch and wait until the Boomrat is somewhere safe and shoot it... :D I don't mind a few sparks for some free meat.

Some more thoughts and highlights from recent play...
  • I restarted my colony when I dropped in a set of new "quality of life" mods (like Psychology and Sometimes Raids Go Wrong) because I wanted to be on the safe side and not have any conflicts or glitches. I re-created my tribal colonists (skills, scars, and existing implants - but couldn't duplicate missing organs/pieces) and gave them a selection of arms and resources to help step up quickly to where I was. Same world seed, same map location, slightly bigger zone (275x275 instead of 250x250). The base map is even better than the 250 version. At first this seemed overpowered, but I quickly ran into an issue with massive raids. Like 30+ tribals, 20+ pirates, or 6+ Synths (As such, I haven't been bashful about loading). I only have 7 colonists, and no turrets. What was I doing wrong? I could only guess it was the high-value items I built - like "Excellent" and "Masterwork" Royal beds. Great for sleep speed, but the value penalty is nuts. I've read that raids are mostly based off the cash value of your colony. Everything from furniture value to pets to turrets. Even your pawns are valued, and Bionics/Archotech increase that value (but not as much as having it laying around). I'm moments from finally re-researching Bionics and making something with the 53 Advanced Components I've rigorously accumulated. Those 53 Advanced Components themselves have a HUGE value. :oops: I'd say the Royal beds aren't worth making to keep. An Excellent or better Double Wooden bed is only worth $153 and has a good enough rest multiplier. An Excellent Wooden bed has 114% rest quality, while the Masterwork Wooden Royal bed is 131% rest quality. 17% isn't worth piles of extra enemies. I had 8 of these gaudy beds, artificially inflating my value. I unloaded them on the first passing trade ship.
  • I had a Poison ship land and hit well outside my quarantine zone, so I thought maybe I'd Mortar it to see what happened. Sure enough, a gaggle of Synths popped out. They didn't attack me, and I wasn't in a rush to go greet them (it was winter, no plants anyway). So they milled around, and I waited. A couple days later, a Manhunter pack of Wargs came along - maybe 12+ of them - and ripped into the Synths. All the Synths were killed, and three wounded Wargs made easy kills. Free meat and parts for everyone!
  • I like the Psychology mod. I don't notice a big difference in how often people flake out, but they flake in more meaningful ways and don't just constantly go on murder/slaughter/destruction sprees. I did have someone get pissy and start hitting a pile of 27 Advanced Components, which almost made me poop myself. It would have been a huge loss. They left it with 11 health. I do like the Dates they go on, Hanging Out with others, and the Mayor effect.
  • Winters continue to be dangerous, even several years in. It's far too easy to accidentally collect too many animals, creating a shortage of food, that leads to animals not being trained properly and/or starvation. I don't bother to stop animals from mating, because breeding can be good income - lots of traders take animals. That said, I don't need 8 Huskies, 7 Boomalopes, 16 Dromedaries, 12 Alpacas, and 6 Rhinos at once. That realization led to me shuffling off the majority of my animals to make peace with the nearest hostile city, and throw in some added trade. I should try to run a colony with no animals and see how I feel about it. I have a reason for everything I was keeping. The Huskies are trained to Haul and Rescue, making them good shufflers and freeing up Colonists for other tasks. The Boomalopes pulled their weight with fuel generation. The Dromedaries are great pack animals, and produce milk/fur. The Alpacas produce lots of wool for Parkas, which trade very well. The Rhinos are my assault animals, now heavily scarred and one is highly upgraded... but for all my animals, I need to have thousands of Kibble to make it through the winter.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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There's a strange satisfaction in "fixing" all those permanent injuries on my colonists with Bionic limbs. Scratched hand? Bionic Arm! Missing a toe? Bionic Leg! Bad Back? Bionic Spine! All of my Transhumanists are quite pleased now. 5 artificial parts seems to be their "peak" happiness. After that, they're still happy but the description shifts from "My parts are amazing" to "I asked for this"

Sadly, I only have enough Advanced parts left to make a couple bionic hearts. I'll have to wait on the rest, and skip the stomachs for now. I wish there was an option for bionic human brains, lungs, kidneys, etc. I'd love to do a full transition to robotics. I have one person left who's missing a kidney and a lung, and I'll have to 'harvest' a raider the next time one survives.

Bionic limbs for humans are still stupid rare at merchants after installing that animal bionics mod. :?
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Fitzy »

Inspired to replay by this thread I loaded up all of the mods on the workshop and got to work.

I remembered my biggest problem, defense and size.

The standard advice on defense seems cheesy. Mazes and such. Are there any guides or anyone have suggestions for defenses that don’t rely on taking advantage of the pathfinding? Or is the maze thing just something I have to accept? To expand, what I’ve seen seems to suggest the best defense is to leave an “easy” door for the enemy to attack, but create a kil zone to reach it. Some have elaborate mazes the peeps run through to get there, but they’ll do it to get that door rather than break the walls. Maybe I’m misreading the guides though.

Any advice on avoiding expansion creep? I felt like I was constantly expanding to add bedrooms, storage and farm fields. I do use a mod to increase the storage capacity, but maybe I need to go higher as storage seemed to fluctuate between a fifth and a third of all my built space. With the fight just to keep people in bedrooms and eating, the rest of my base was primative and just on the good side of functional. If I built defenses, my base fell apart. I had the same issues non-modded so I don’t believe that contributed entirely, though the next mentioned mod may have by reducing time available.

An amusing note, one mod I added was hygiene. It requires waste disposal (outhouses in my case) and wash water. Surprisingly fun, annoying and amusing. I’m teetering on removing it just because it adds another thing the pawns have to do throughout the day and it might have contributed to my struggles. However I’ll miss the bedpans if I do.

Yeah, I’ll remove it. I had just got enough breathing room to build the infrastructure for indoor plumbing (well, pump, tower). It occurs to me that the wasted man hours and resources just on the infrastructure did likely make things harder than they should have been. Plus the constant need to pee and wash took likely took away another hour or two per day. Oh well. I suspect I’ll still have the same issues, but maybe less pronounced. Or I’ll flame out quickly.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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Fitzy wrote: Tue Nov 20, 2018 8:27 amI remembered my biggest problem, defense...
I've been building into a mountain, so defense comes down to keeping things out - and avoiding Infestations. Having the option to make Infestation Bait (a mod, with the settings bumped up from 50% chance to 85% chance to deflect an Infestation) helps.

I don't feel like mazes or killboxes are all that great in 1.0. Enemies seem to have a fair chance to spawn as drop-pods, sieges, or sappers. All of those circumvent killboxes and pathing traps. Having recently played for a while, my gut feeling on this is that there's a 25% chance for a regular raid, 25% sappers, 25% siege, 15% drop-pod, with the rest being a mixed bag of Manhunters, Infestations, and Crashed Ships. That means, as far as I've been feeling it, most raids will try to find some way to bypass your defensive line. Those drop-pod attacks can land right in your base if it's not under a thick mountain roof.

My killzone isn't a "box" and has only been helpful against basic raids, synth attacks that start well away from my base, and Manhunters. I've had to set up basic static defenses (wall segments) for my colonists to use to attack the areas the AI keeps trying to launch sappers against, and I haul out a few extra sniper rifles against sieges, and then run back to my killzone when they break and attack manually after I kill a few of them. I've had some luck with using Mortars, but they're very hit or miss (no pun intended) and often end up a waste of resources; even with three of them firing at once, you might miss every enemy in a cluster that's milling around and prepping to attack you.

I do lay a lot of traps on common pathing routes and near common defenses enemies use - and they do help out. Simple wooden traps can cut a raider in half, granite traps can kill them outright (a more substantial investment, though). Where enemies keep trying to use sappers to tunnel, the leading pawns end up moving over a dozen wooden traps before they get to their tunnel points; sometimes that kills the sappers and the raid reverts to a normal one and attacks.

In my current playthrough, I've yet to build a single turret. I should, though, as they do help with the melee enemies - but everything else fires outside their range. I do have the more turrets mod, and should explore them as real options - but I haven't cracked the research open for that as I've been working towards bionics and medical.

One thing I haven't tried doing is building a completely locked down mountain base where the killzone is inside the mountain, and even drop-pods need to deal with getting through it; that could eliminate the threat of sieges and drops, just leaving me with sappers.

Enemy AI will always look for the path of lease resistance. That part hasn't changed. They seem like they'll take on a wooden door before they attack a pair of granite doors, and they'll attack doors before walls ... so you can lure them to certain points. It's just that they have many ways to get there.

*Edit: Now that I think on it, I may not be a good authority on defense. I actually like getting into firefights and don't design cheesy defenses to exploit the AI. I just try and build what feels logical and improve it based on how attacks are hitting me and what has or hasn't worked for a given base.
Fitzy wrote: Tue Nov 20, 2018 8:27 am...and size.
I use a 10x stack multiplier mod. I have a 20x20 storage area inside holds most everything I need, but also have a side-storage just for Hay where my animals sleep, a second 20x20 freezer for animals/meat/veggies/herbal meds, a smaller freezer next to my Rec room for meal storage, and have recently started using a tiny freezer with storage shelves in the medbay (which is outside the base proper for quick access) for medical supplies and meals. My colonists' rooms are all 5x6, and my hallways tend to be 3 wide with single-door choke points and 5-wide intersections (useful for infestation defenses). When I get Hydroponics, I stick that out by the freezers for quicker harvest/drop-off. I don't mind meandering bases that maybe aren't perfectly efficient. Medical bays are really the only exception; that needs to be quickly accessible.

I routinely form caravans to sell off excess animals, leathers, furs, fuel, meds, clothing, and weapons. Clothing and weapons, in particular, can choke out your storage space quickly. Having a friendly town nearby - and living on a road that lets you travel there in less than two days - is great. Send out one or two colonists and a boatload of excess goods.

I tend to use the "Plan" tool extensively before I ever mine out a single tile on the first day. I sketch out where I'll put all of my essential rooms and then expand into the planned areas as needed. My colonist rooms all spin off one hallway that extends into the mountain - and I just make that hall a little longer if I need more bedrooms.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Fitzy »

Paingod wrote: Tue Nov 20, 2018 9:46 am I tend to use the "Plan" tool extensively before I ever mine out a single tile on the first day. I sketch out where I'll put all of my essential rooms and then expand into the planned areas as needed. My colonist rooms all spin off one hallway that extends into the mountain - and I just make that hall a little longer if I need more bedrooms.
Thank you Paingod. That was a great write up. I decided to go with a mountain base for a new attempt and got a lovely canyon with a small entrance. I trapped the hell out of it and most of the early raids are retreating before even getting into bow range. Traps were great advice! Your defense advice was exactly what I was looking for, I dislike the idea of cheesing the victories, but traps in a natural choke point feel “real” to me. Mazes and fake doors are where I get stuck between game tactics that probably work and not wanting hollow victories.

I should plan out things, but I tend to wing it. One big issue I have is that I will control myself for a little while, build slow and steady, small expansion and then reach a point where everything appears to be going well. At that point I pause and build a huge expansion thinking it will go well. It never does. Sooner or later the massive expansion leaves a hole in the defenses, or causes a disease, or everyone runs to the other end of the map just as a raid drops behind me, or Cassandra decides she hates me.

There’s so many ways to screw up. I love it. :D

Curious how my first infestation will go this time. I’ve done mountain bases before and usually ended up struggling. I am liking your five space intersections, nice cover.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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My mountain home was wiped by an infestation. Technically I won. But all of my soldiers except one (who slept through it!) were injured and/or lost limbs. Three ended up dying to infection. With it being late winter, my hunters dead or incapacitated, low food and medicine, I called it over.

It was a good ending. I think I’m going to try another plains play through but with the embrasures mod.

Speaking of mods, Giddy-up is vastly amusing. It allows pawns to ride animals. I think my next play through is going to be with horse nomads settling down after losing a civil war.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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I haven't let my colony die, but it does take beatings. I'm not bashful about reloading a day's autosave if I suffer a horrific wipe. I've invested too much into these pawns to let them die easy... :D ... some day I might be bold enough to play Ironman... but I'm not there yet.

I've played so much of this lately that it's surpassed XCOM 2 in raw hours. I don't feel like I'm done playing, but have been wanting to play something else. This game has an undeniable draw for me.

My Raids are now generally 30+ Mercenaries (often with multiple Doomsday Launchers and Triple Launchers), 40+ tribals, 12+ powerful Manhunters (like Rhinos), or 12+ Synths with more than half of them as Centipedes. Infestations are nightmare fuel.

My base...
Enlarge Image
We have:
  • North: Bedroom hallway
  • West: Rec Room, Production, and Kitchen, 20x20 freezer and 20x20 general storage. 3xHydroponics off behind Rec Room.
  • South: Two prison cells, Medbay, Power Plant and Infestation Bait (mod required) room
  • Outside: Farm fields, defensive line
All of those bedrooms are temperature-managed by one AC unit and one Heater. Everything else is Vents to move the heat/cooling around.

The Infestation Bait room uses fire to kill the pests. I've stacked a number of stools down there, and ignite them with a molotov. As they burn and the fire spreads, the large room superheats and the insects die from heat stroke. After they expire, I let the room cool and send in a cleanup crew to sweep the hives and start collecting bodies for kibble production. If the stools don't generate enough heat, I'll send someone in with molotovs and keep tossing them into open space, generating more heat. Eventually I'll figure out how much wood I need to leave to generate a lethal amount of heat with one toss & run. You can see where I've patched the walls after the last infestation.

I've got 10 Huskies trained to help with hauling - but not combat. I use 6 Rhinos, heavily modified (Animal Cybernetics mod) for combat. I've named the Rhinos things like X10M01 - Indicating 10 cybernetic parts on Male 01. That particular Rhino moves 16 spaces per second and does 16dps - is worth over $7,000 on the market and is almost immune to being bled to death. He goes down like a Synth - raw beating, almost no bleeding. I also have 10 Dromedaries to help with caravan work, and 3/4 Boomalopes for fuel. Everything else is transient and gets sold off.

I have a huge collection of dead animals in the freezer. They take up less space this way until I'm ready to use them, and are less susceptible to being destroyed by power loss (Solar Flare). If the bodies get close to rotting, I can quickly carve a number of them up for meat, which will make it through the event. I try and turn meat into Kibble or Meals as soon as I carve it up, and use mostly Simple Meals made of veggies to feed my colonists.

One of those rare Manhunter vs. Synth Ship battles...
Enlarge Image
If I poke a ship piece to trigger the Synth occupants (either by Mortar or Sniper Rifle) and I don't attack them, my faction allies will eventually move in to help... or a Raid will drop on them, or a Manhunter pack. Either way, someone helps reduce their strength before I deal with them. Ideally they soak a hostile attack. If the ship lands in my farmlands, I'm in for a rough fight and put up a number of defenses just for the fight, and include two EMP-tossing pawns to mitigate the Synth forces.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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I’ll reload in a heartbeat if it’s a stupid death. Sometimes I accept the loss if it gains me something. If the loss was such that it shows a fundamental flaw in my design that I can’t see a way around, then I’ll restart. I think I’m also discovering I like the early part of strategy games the most :lol:

I switched to Phoebe on my current play through. She gives a much longer time between events. I’ll probably change over to one of the others once I feel like testing myself more.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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Phoebe is way more my speed than Cassandra. I even have it on Rough and am doing ok. Or was.

In late summer I got hit by a blight that wiped out virtually my entire crop, most importantly it killed my hay. Without the hay I could make kibble. I rushed a new crop but got hit by an early cold snap which ended the growing season in early fall. In late fall I got hit by a volcanic winter.

I ended up having to kill all of my chickens. Which on the plus side bumped my FPS. Whoops, all of them except three I kept to repopulate the species. I moved them into my main barracks so they can share my meals.

I’ve kept my horses and llamas alive by allowing them to roam freely, which causes me to lose one occasionally to a predator. I supplement their food with full meals, which isn’t working great because they spoil in 3 days. So either I don’t have enough for all my people and the animals or I have too much depending on how the animals do foraging on their on.

So now I’m researching electricity, geothermal power, hydroponics and climate control as fast as I can to set up an indoor farm and to freeze stuff. But the vents are far from my main base, meaning they’ll be vulnerable to attack.

Which I just got hit with last night. Tonight I’ll play through the attack and see what happens.

I sent out my best trader with all of my non-pregnant horses to see if she can find a source of vegetation to supplement until I can get the indoor farms running. Meanwhile I keep hoping the volcanic winter will end with the real one, but I’m reading it can last up to 40 days. I’m on day 14.

This is fun :D

The downside is my performance is dropping. Which is odd. I know my computer is long in the tooth and it’s scheduled for replacement next year. However, the CPU isn’t fully utilized and the GPU is hardly moving. So I’m uncertain where the bottleneck is or how to fix it.

I should say I know the mods are heavily contributing to the stuttering, I’m just surprised there isn’t any obvious component getting hammered.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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Fitzy wrote: Mon Nov 26, 2018 9:04 amPhoebe is way more my speed than Cassandra. I even have it on Rough and am doing ok. Or was.
Cassandra can be overwhelming. Sometimes I haven't even full recovered from one event before the next one hits. It's no fun to drag people out of hospital beds to man the defensive line.
Fitzy wrote: Mon Nov 26, 2018 9:04 amIn late summer I got hit by a blight that wiped out virtually my entire crop, most importantly it killed my hay. Without the hay I could make kibble. I rushed a new crop but got hit by an early cold snap which ended the growing season in early fall. In late fall I got hit by a volcanic winter.
Sounds ... familiar. :lol: Note on Blights - Instead of cutting down your entire crop, it's worth it to pause the game and selectively cut the blighted plants. I set my best farmers to "Cut Plant" as a top priority, queue up all the plants, and unpause it at normal speed. As new plants are infected, I select them for razing. It might jump two or three times, but you'll save the majority of your crops over forcing an early harvest.

Same thing when I get hit with a Cold Snap - only then I "Harvest" all my fields, prioritize everyone for "Tend Plant" work, and turn them loose. I do a lot of damage control by modifying priorities often. If I've got too much clutter, I have everyone set to "Haul" for a couple days.
Fitzy wrote: Mon Nov 26, 2018 9:04 amI supplement their food with full meals, which isn’t working great because they spoil in 3 days. So either I don’t have enough for all my people and the animals or I have too much depending on how the animals do foraging on their on.
Before I get Refrigeration, I tend to set my kitchens to "Make Until You Have 20" - it stocks enough for the colonists and a few animals to eat during the day, and keeps the cooks from over-burdening the store room with meals that go sour in a couple days anyway. It also speeds up cooking to have a "drop" site right there at the oven. A 3-square Stockpile set to receive meals only, low priority. Then set the Meal bills to be sent there when complete. I've dabbled, too, with keeping veggies next to the stove for cooking with but it felt wasteful to leave food there, unfrozen.
Fitzy wrote: Mon Nov 26, 2018 9:04 amSo now I’m researching electricity, geothermal power, hydroponics and climate control as fast as I can to set up an indoor farm and to freeze stuff. But the vents are far from my main base, meaning they’ll be vulnerable to attack.
Geothermal is nice, but its not the end of the world if you can't get it. Tame a few Boomalopes and "milk" them for Chemfuel, and install a few Chem Generators (I think these come by default with Electricity). I have 4 "Infinite ChemFuel Reactors" producing 75 Fuel every 6 days, and 4 Boomalopes - and I can sustain something like 7 or 8 generators, each turning out 1000Kw. The real downside to this is the heat. Those generators can turn a room into a 150º sauna. A couple vents to the outside can fix it.
Fitzy wrote: Mon Nov 26, 2018 9:04 amThis is fun :D
Yes it is. :D
Fitzy wrote: Mon Nov 26, 2018 9:04 amThe downside is my performance is dropping. Which is odd. I know my computer is long in the tooth and it’s scheduled for replacement next year. However, the CPU isn’t fully utilized and the GPU is hardly moving. So I’m uncertain where the bottleneck is or how to fix it.
I don't know what to say. I haven't had any performance issues, but my PC is pretty robust. I've even tried it on a tablet, and it plays okay - but I can't say I noticed a problem just because I had more animals or activity. Mostly it was just much slower to load, generate worlds, etc.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Fitzy »

Thanks for the advice Paingod. The lack of refrigeration is rough. I’m liking the tribal start though, especially with my “expanded” research tree.

As for performance, I got it back to acceptable by killing the chickens, even the couple I kept to repopulate the species. 🤷🏻‍♂️ I suspect it’s something to do with one of the mods, but it’s not irritating enough at the moment to search for. It’s mostly just big stutters of 20+ FPS. It might have to with me being a hoarder too. I have a huge animal collection and massive stockpiles. I’m working on the issue :D

It’s still not where I would expect given that the processor hovers around 50-65% but it’s good enough. I’m running an i5 3570k. It’s starting to show up as the minimum spec for games and I expect it will soon be below spec, but it’s chugging along for now. I really want to wait for the new AMD Zen 2s *drool*
Paingod wrote: Mon Nov 26, 2018 9:28 am
Tame a few Boomalopes and "milk" them for Chemfuel, and install a few Chem Generators (I think these come by default with Electricity). I have 4 "Infinite ChemFuel Reactors" producing 75 Fuel every 6 days, and 4 Boomalopes - and I can sustain something like 7 or 8 generators, each turning out 1000Kw. The real downside to this is the heat. Those generators can turn a room into a 150º sauna. A couple vents to the outside can fix it.
Um, 4 boomalopes? I started gathering boomalopes and set the manager to 15 I think. I may need to rethink that. :doh: Hoarding.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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Fitzy wrote: Tue Nov 27, 2018 8:59 amUm, 4 boomalopes? I started gathering boomalopes and set the manager to 15 I think. I may need to rethink that. :doh: Hoarding.
I hoard animals too. I wouldn't sweat the extras as long as you can feed them. The excess Chemfuel is nice for selling off to passing traders. Note: If you can't feed them for some reason, assign them to a small patch of grass somewhere quiet and execute them at range. The last thing you need is a starved Boomalope exploding in your base when it expires due to malnutrition.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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GreenGoo wrote: Sun Sep 04, 2016 4:18 pm Maybe my son will decide to buy it on a whim, then I get to play it for free. :D
Bam! 2 years later and my son just bought it this morning. He was on the fence last night because he was worried it was too complicated for him. I'm guessing comparisons to Dwarf Fortress had him scared. He plays Dwarf Fortress all the time, but only as a Rogue-like, never as a builder. I feel like he might be the only person in the universe who does that.

In any case, I explained that the game was never going to be cheaper because the developer has said it will never go on sale and has stuck to his guns for years (otherwise I'd already own it, natch. :wink: ). Well, the money was burning hole in his steam wallet and something caused him to focus on Rimworld (probably some youtube videos he stumbled across) and when I found him this morning he was at the computer, trying to figure it out.

So now I get to play it too! And all I had to do was give my son the money so he could buy it by proxy for me. :D In all seriousness he had the money left over from Christmas and found Rimworld and his resulting interest in it on his own. I don't think I've ever even mentioned the name in his presence before yesterday when he came and asked me if I knew anything about it. Still though, I'm not going to not play it out of some weird principle. It's right there. Gleaming. Calling to me.
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by jztemple2 »

I think someday there will be a therapist very interested in all that manipulation :wink:
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Holman »

Hey!

I'm thinking of giving RimWorld a whirl.

Are there any mods widely considered must-haves? I'm not interested in vastly changing the game, but I'd love to know which ones an experienced player won't play without.

Thanks!
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

Post by Sepiche »

I'd say Rimworld plays perfectly fine without mods, especially the first few times you play. Here's a few of the general mods I like to use:

EdB Prepare Carefully - Widely used mod that lets you setup every detail of your start. Better than spending hours randomly rolling new pawns once you've played a few games

While You're Up [1.0] - Just a small mod that streamlines hauling jobs by making pawns look for nearby hauling jobs when they are already headed somewhere

Defensive Positions - Mod that lets you specify defensive positions for each character and save them so all you have to do for defense is click one button and everyone knows where to go

Misc. Training - Mod that adds training dummies so characters can slowly/safely get better at shooting and melee
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Re: RimWorld (New DF-like)

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I would highly endorse all of those, though I've never used the training dummies because it kind of felt like cheating. The others, though, are serious and logical time savers.
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