Can you survive the attacks indefinitely ?

[Borfoid]

I'm curious.

I really like the game and I'm happy to sit here trying to live out life on the planet and, so far, I'm part way through year three and I can cope with the attacks. I just click "New Game" and go with whatever settings were there at the time, no mods.

I know the attacks get worse but not it feels like I'm ahead of the curve, I'm wondering if there comes a time that no matter how well you're doing at the time it'll throw a wave of enemies at you that you just can't beat ?

Is it just a countdown to doomsday or is it an arms race you can actually win ?

[HAZ]

I believe I've had a 10yr game on hard (not very hard) and while the attacks were definitely in the thousands, my huge array of turrets and traps (traps placed in a good maze is key) took care of it without a single survivor needing to be involved.

This is esp. important if you are running solo or if your last survivor is waiting on the evacuation pod...

But I guess you want to go for decades?

I imagine a point will come that small damage doesn't get repaired before the next attack wave arrives and the damage starts adding up... eventually leaving a collapsed colony.

I doubt you could live out a peaceful life indefinitely.

[parvuslupus]

I think that's extremely exaggerated, especially if "medium / normal" is selected.
just developing and hoping for rescue.

the balancing needs to be revised.

in the hard and extreme mode where you want to be challenged i think it's fine.

but how is it supposed to work there at the moment....

[Borfoid]

Ah well - sounds like if I picked the easiest setting possible it's still a ticking clock and if I pick a more difficult setting it's just less of a head start, that's a bit disappointing.

I know I can turn off attacks and/or mod the game but I was hoping for a bit of middle vanilla ground, not just previous attack + more, forever.

Thanks for the info.

[Paddy]

It doesn't get more difficult with Time. The attacks are based on your difficulty, defenses, survivor numbers etc

[Borfoid]

Originally posted by Paddy:

It doesn't get more difficult with Time. The attacks are based on your difficulty, defenses, survivor numbers etc

Ok, I'm gonna test that... I know how to test that.

[wcbarney]

Originally posted by Paddy:

It doesn't get more difficult with Time. The attacks are based on your difficulty, defenses, survivor numbers etc

Yes, in another thread one of the devs posted, a couple of months ago, that the strength of the attacks (but not their frequency) increases because of:

(1) More survivors;
(2) More traps and automated turrets; and
(3) More overall strength, measured by buildings, resources, etc., but not specifically the length of your fortification walls.

[Borfoid]

The only thing I did to go from land based attacks which can't even get past my front door to aerial attacks which bypass all my defences was move from wood to brick walls.

I guess if extra integrity, which was a byproduct of my upgrade there not the focus, triggers harder waves of enemies that's fine. I can still cope with those waves... My only worry was it'll get too much too quick.

1. More survivors - they've been constant
2. More traps/turrets/fort - been constant for a year or so pretty much
3. I've changed my buildings gradually from wood to brick because I can.

If we're saying that when I've finished upgrading my buildings the difficulty level of the attack waves will remain unchanged - I can deal with that. Flying waves are fun, at least right now.

[Flin Fredstone]

There were sessions of people running their base past 40 years. Back when it was just crash landing to choose from. I don't know if they played peaceful mode though.
Personally i played on easy at the start because a: i am a slow learner and b: my rig can't handle stupendous numbers of enemies. I played until year 19.

[Actual Malice]

Courtesy of a reposting by Elgar, perhaps this is the dev thread to which wcbarney is referring:

"Gathering resources and constructing structures does gradually increase the size of the attacks. However, the game doesn't scale the size of the attacks based on the number of fences or walls you have. This scale is only affected by active defenses, such as traps and turrets. Additionally, the frequency of attacks is controlled solely by the chosen moon and difficulty."

"Every hour, the game evaluates the strength of your settlement by considering factors such as the number of survivors, available resources, and constructed buildings. On higher difficulty levels, the evaluation may also take into account the duration of your playthrough. If you have installed mods that allow you to start with more survivors and resources, your settlement's strength will increase, causing larger attacks to occur in the early stages of the game."

Source : https://steamcommunity.com/app/1324130/discussions/0/3821907717320618320/

This tidbit ought to be pinned at the top of the page, because we are referring to it constantly and new players have no way of knowing.

I have always wondered what "tak[ing] into account the duration of your playthrough" means. It doesn't exactly explain whether extended duration increases the strength of attacks, or whether the algorithm backs off a bit after a while.

Nineteen years? Wow, boggles the mind.

[Dycart]

One of the things I discovered while pouring through the posts about it being too difficult was that the more popular mods crank up the difficulty as a by-product. For example, many players download the mod to increase stack sizes. As a result, players are hording resources. Since resource amount is part of the equation used to determine the difficulty of each attack, those players were being quickly overwhelmed. Once I learned that, I went back to vanilla and purposefully do not build storage beyond what I'm going to need quickly. It has greatly reduced the frustration of the attacks. Now, on year 4, 2 flame throwers and 2 machine gun turrets have been able to handle anything that has come my way.