Ways to defend vs large raids?

[Indianer]

I am building up a base, have food sources and some base defenses. I have about 14 men who are mostly between 10-20 in combat stats, and have decent armor and weapons but not great.

I can easily defend raids from any size group of bandits with several crossbow turrets on building tops. But when a large group (10-20) Band of Bones comes rolling through, it is game over or I have to flee to the nearest city then come back and revive anyone who didn’t make it.

How do you defend against these guys? What is needed to defend against them, or is there some way to make peace for now? They are heavily armored with good stats, and usually come in packs of 15 or more.

I’m guessing I need at least 4 more highly skilled people with heavy armor to defend, and even then I estimate I will have to revive half of them each attack. Maybe even lose a limb or two each raid. This seems pretty harsh.

[[Castiel]]

You need kill gates. Once you have those built it's easy defending your town.

[mr_bman]

Buy buildings in towns and get more experienced before building an outpost. Get your tech level up high so when you do build an outpost you'll have good defenses ready to build. Really get yourself established. Get good at stealth so you can limit how many times you get attacked when you're outside of town. You can get a higher payday by staying to towns because there's always a lot of ore deposits around them. Places to sell are right next door.

[danielj213]

I feel your pain. When I built my outpost I didn't even realize I would get raided regularly. The two problems I had right off the bat were Black Dragon Ninjas and Band of Bones. As mr_bman says, start in town. That's what I did. I bought the largest building available in The Hub. I set up training dummies, xbow turret trainers, and loaded up my chars to build strength. I stocked building materials during this time to make sure I had everything I needed to build my base and defenses. Once I got my butt kicked a few times I hired mercs and that was a huge help until my group skills were up. Now those fools die at the gates.

[bol]

if it is an announced attack, have a sneaky guy that can knock people out intercept them and kidnap the leader.

[Mastercow]

Before I was capable of fighting them off I would send someone with high athletics to lead them away. Would just have them chase me until I found a caravan or something else they would attack.

[Lithographer]

single recessed entrance, walls with turrets, you want them to run the gauntlet, but think outside the killbox, think venetian 'kill-hallway', the trick? you want them to SWIM the gauntlet, build the gate at the edge of water, so no matter what they have to swim to your gate. watching them slog up to your gate under constant fire is fantastic, the water gives your crossbows all the time in the world to wipe them out. as little as like a handfull of trained turrets could wipe a 30+ raid with a long enough 'venetian entrance'

and for those mountain/desert folk with no water, or rivers of any kind then i would build the same pattern but add a second gate at the start with a maze in the middle, use whatever cheap low path blocking obsticals (NOT those room divider walls) low stuff so they wont have cover from the turrets while running the "maze", just build it so they cant just run stright to the second gate. the first gate gives you time to man the guns then when your turrets are ready open the first gate,that is if they havent bashed their way in already.

now only if we could just do some light terraforming and build our own moats... thats it we need a moats mod.

[lubed_assassin]

how far away are you from a town? mercenaries and tech hunters are cheap if your using them for a specific purpose...

[Indianer]

I’m not too far from a couple towns. I can always have runners take them away, or just run to safety and come back for the others. I have several buildings with turrets, which works great for any weaker raiders. But the band of bones guys are pretty strong. I really wasn’t expecting that.

I guess I will have to keep retreating for a little longer. I do have training facilities set up, and most of my players are as high as they can train to. They still need work, and maybe a few heavy tanks. I am planning on recruiting at least 2-3 more heavy fighters and a couple more gunners to man the turrets.

That should make the base pretty easy to defend for even the big raids.

But I still want to do some raiding myself. So I will need more income and many more recruits of high level before a squad can leave the base, I’m thinking.

[Zee_]

Design or rebuild your walls and gates so you have a good old fashioned killbox with a nice crossfire going.

One thing to note about turrets, don't go for the fancy ones that fire multiple shots. Multi-shot turrets can hit multiple targets but have a damage penalty, they're good for lots of weak enemies but heavily armored mobs will just stroll on through. Go for the highest damage per shot to penetrate armor. Also from my own testing, mounting a light on a turret is a sure fire way to lower its maximum range and accuracy. Just set up a series of wall mounted spotlights so the pathway or maze leading to your gate is lit up, so your people aren't firing blind, have better accuracy and longer range than the light mounted turrets.

A good entry maze or just a decently sized corridor leading to a gate with a handfull of turrets on each side will usually wipe out whoever is dumb enough to try and assault your base. And as Lithographer mentioned above, if you happen to be in an area where you can take advantage of the terrain to slow down the attackers a bit, nothing will ever touch your gate.

As for needing alot of rookies, its faster to train smaller groups of recruits than larger ones. The more people in your squad the less combat experience each one is going to get.

I'd suggest setting up shop in a city for the time being, research your way up to tier 3 or 4, by the time you reach it you should have a solid defense squad and be ready for new recruits.

You could also try and stick it out where you are of course, theres nothing wrong with losing fights. Thats the best way to train up toughness, which is imo the most important stat in the game. Its awesome seeing characters who should be dead stand back up and take out their attackers by sheer force of will alone.

[Indianer]

I have been building while defending, but having plenty of crops and money coming in makes it easier. Lots of rocks and iron mining going on.

My base is going to be more of a large city. Maybe largest in game eventually? I have plenty of room to add on around the main base. The main base sits on top of a cliff with a path up to it that goes all the way around the hill. And I have that portion finally walled in now

I am building turrets along the wall, so that enemies approaching up the path will be running along the wall for a very long distance, while I rain down bolts from above.

Also, the main base on top of the cliff consists of three building which face each other in a triangle. Each with two turrets mounted on top, facing the center. It’s a slaughter zone, where my men fight while supported from the 6 turrets around them. The fighters have decent armor and defense, and just act as tanks while the turrets support.

Eventually I will build out the city around that cliff, and have all my mining facilities and farming operations enclosed with a second outer wall.

What I really need is about 5 more tanks with heavy armor and 30+ stats, and a few more gunners.

But for now I am able to hold off just about everything coming in. Just those band of bones guys that give me a hard time. I can barely survive with maybe a couple heavily wounded men to pick up the pieces, which I really do not enjoy.

[cdplayer906]

base building is mid game.

[Nemerlight]

I just move my troops away and try luring enemies 1 by 1. You need to fight in this game to lv up your skills quicker so getting your ass kicked isnt that bad early on.

[Giltirn]

Originally posted by cdplayer906:

base building is mid game.

Doesn't it then seem completely pointless to have low-tech buildings, defenses and walls? If it is expected that you only venture out when you can build high-tier crossbows and fortifications then they should just remove the lower tiers entirely.

As a side note, do raiders actually take anything from your base? I have stacks of food and high value weapons that never seem to be touched when the raiders maraud through my town.

[Indianer]

Originally posted by Giltirn:

Originally posted by cdplayer906:

base building is mid game.

Doesn't it then seem completely pointless to have low-tech buildings, defenses and walls? If it is expected that you only venture out when you can build high-tier crossbows and fortifications then they should just remove the lower tiers entirely.

As a side note, do raiders actually take anything from your base? I have stacks of food and high value weapons that never seem to be touched when the raiders maraud through my town.

I don’t think they do take anything. I have never seen anything disappear, except maybe two or three food items and maybe some bandages. It doesn’t seem like the AI is programmed to take anything else of value.

I agree that you can easily start buildings earlier on in the game. You just might have to run when raids happen, or lure them by breaking them up into smaller group.

A few houses with turrets on top facing each other can easily handle any raid, with gunners on ge turrets and tanks to fight. My squad of 12 people, with stats in their 10s and 20s, could easily handle any raids with this set up, except for the band of bones guys.

With a few more tanks and gunners, a bit higher combat stats, and a few extra turrets, I can now defend against even the larger band of bone raids.

It is pretty costly, with scores of heavily wounded, but my recruits get to level up their stats during all of this, rather than beating on training dummies in their safe places back home. I’m going to be raising a battle hardened army, not some coddled knights in polished ornamental armor.

[Cheetah]

I too am having trouble establishing an outpost long term. I built one outside Stack once. It ran good for about 12 in-game days, fended off several raids by bandits.

Then the Band of Bones Shek warriors (about 30 of them) decided to wipe us out. Seemed like my guys whom could wreck bandits with ease, couldn't even get one Shek down. Shek's wiped out everyone and then patrolled my outpost until everyone died, knocking down anyone who dared to get up. Before someone asks, yes I had hired mercs to assist in defending my outpost. They got wiped out just as easily as my own guys.

Needless to say, this was pretty demoralizing. I reverted to a save just prior to establishing the outpost, to return to Squin for more training.

I have about 25 capable fighters in my group. By capable, I mean, they have 45-50 melee attack and weapon skill. 30-40 str, 40-50 dex, 10-20 toughness, light armor (all specialist grade) and catun #1 ninja blades. Some of my guys now carry sabres, to give a little more variety (Crafted by my guys, again Catun #1 on the sabres)

I suppose that's the most frustating part of this game. You think your band of guys is getting pretty stong, until you spot a group of something, give it a try and get splattered all over the field with not a single enemy getting KO'd. There's no inbetween it seems. You either get utterly wrecked, or you utterly wreck the opposition. No close fights?

My revisited training regime will have my guys trying to get their toughness to around 40-50, and get melee defense and dodge up to approximately the same levels, as those two stats are single digits on most of my guys. (Mostly dodge sucks, a lot of the team has melee defense in the 20's or 30's)