Best scenario and map ?

[Kiz]

i have DLC

[Flin Fredstone]

Well that is kinda personal preference isn't it ?
I can't tell you what is best. You have to try them out yourself and see where you have the most enjoyment.

[Red Bat]

As boring as it sounds, Sobrius is by a wide margin my favorite region. The lack of any real winter in the other two regions both kind of makes things easier and also kind of renders a few of the game mechanics not worth engaging with since you can grow crops year round and only have moderate temperature changes. Actually a little disappointed that this is the only region where hydroponics and winter clothing are useful. Everything you learn in the tutorial is useful here. Only real gripe I have is that the animals are a little less interesting than in the other regions, and the gujo's tend to outright go extinct a lot faster than the comparable animals in the other regions, forcing you to tame them fast if you want to save them.

After Sorbrius I like Desertium. The more limited wood, less useful soil and less useful plants adds some challenges you don't see in Sobrius. Also feels very different overall, with interesting animals and wide open spaces.

Saltu is just ridiculously easy. Purple leaf effectively means cutting bushes gets you 50% more usable material, and it counts as a trade good, for what little that matters. Wood is somehow even more plentiful than on Sobrius, and both plants and animals are significantly more useful with almost non-existent temperature issues. Heck there's trees that give you 150 wood (shame you can't grow them). You can even get crystals without research. The only challenge here is insect nests have scissorhands instead of shriekers, which makes engaging with them much less rewarding overall.

As for scenarios? Guardians just barely makes for the most interesting to me. It's basically Crash Landed, but with trading mechanics, some different expeditions, and robot attacks instead of insect attacks. Kinda wish that the robot's didn't completely replace the insects, but at least they are very different to fight. Robots add an immense challenge to the early game on difficulties where you don't start with a laser pistol, but they arguably make the game easier overtime once you can deal with them due to being able to scavenge advanced stuff from them. Hope's also interesting, although you kind of need to plan around her entirely. Typically you let her do all the research to build her sentience, and then what else you do with her dictates what gaps you want your other survivors to fill. Usually people recommend specializing her in crafting and eventually letting her become capable of combat, although you can do other things with her such as letting her farm.

I like Crash Landed almost as much as guardians. It's the default scenario and has the second most expedition events associated with it. Unlike the other non-DLC scenarios you can find survivors, and you don't get any big freebies in terms of scenario exclusive research, so the entire tech tree is pretty useful. Overall the most balanced experience.

Distant third favorite would the the military outpost one. 6 survivors, with no replacements. But you face much much larger raids (Junos on the first raid even) and get a bunch of exclusive researches that make it way way faster to get going. Probably the best scenario if you want to very quickly get a decent outpost setup and start getting to the advanced technologies. You can even just outright craft mech cores. That said it's a bit samey due to the printer technologies you get effectively narrowing down your playstyle a bit.

Least favorite for me is the merchant one. It's a cool idea, but man is it unbelievably slow. You have to hire survivors other than your starting ones. You are supposed to try to make money sending stuff off planet but unlike Rimworld the game isn't really designed for you to create stuff to sell, which leads to it feeling really off. On top of it, they made one of the survivors pretty much designed for you to pick for this scenario, which makes them feel boring in other scenarios and almost mandatory in this one. It just feels like aside from the trading mechanic (which is also in Guardians), this scenario just doesn't have much going for it to make it interesting.

[Zep Tepi]

Depends on what you like.

Most challenge? Guardians DLC. Robot attackers, and Hope sentience mechanic. Might want to read up on Hope because a lot of people have trouble figuring it out. (There is a mod that will give you robot attackers in other scenarios if that's your thing.)

Standard play to win? Crash landing.

Laid back colony builder? Or like lots of people? Trade scenario. You can hire people easily and buy more tech.

Most resource intensive? Military. Don't take this one without printed components unless you're a masochist.

Biomes:

Sobrius has distinct seasons, but almost never gets terribly hot. Stock up crops for winter, but the cold will help your food last longer. Start working on winter clothing asap.

Saltu is the tropical region. Food spoils a lot faster, but it's practically always available. No carbon in nests, but synthetics and crystal can be found on the map instead. Gets really hot, almost never cold. Also has the crop blight mechanic.

Desertum is designed as a challenge. The seasons aren't a big deal, but every day has extreme temperatures between day and night. Resources, like wood, may be scarce, but stone is plentiful. Has a lot of flat area if you like to build big.

As for favorites, my order is Saltu, Desertum, and Sobrius last. I usually do solo trade scenarios, but I mix it up when I get an idea for something to try.

Do look at the mods in the workshop, especially SAD Common Lib, which has some official/unofficial bug fixes in it.

[Felis_Exploria]

Originally posted by Red Bat:

Least favorite for me is the merchant one. It's a cool idea, but man is it unbelievably slow. You have to hire survivors other than your starting ones. You are supposed to try to make money sending stuff off planet but unlike Rimworld the game isn't really designed for you to create stuff to sell, which leads to it feeling really off. On top of it, they made one of the survivors pretty much designed for you to pick for this scenario, which makes them feel boring in other scenarios and almost mandatory in this one. It just feels like aside from the trading mechanic (which is also in Guardians), this scenario just doesn't have much going for it to make it interesting.

I can understand this view. I actually like the trading post. I found that cotton or carbon are OP and had to stop using them for a challenge. I never hire help and still get the million within 2 years. I like trying different themed merchants: wine if landing near berries, pipes and antibiotics as a pharmacist, CPU and electronics as a tech merchant, leather and meat as a rancher, etc. I also like that with only 3 you really have to plan for increased attacks. When one survivor is across the map, harvesting/observing, defending with only two can be challenging.