CE and early poison/mech ships.

[Rokko]

just out of curiosity, whats your strategy when when it comes to those bastid ships early game?

using CE as always, im not kidding, this is my 3d colony in a row which has no means to effectively deal with them.
in my current game i had one Defoliator crash and shortly after a Psychic Ship.
i tortured my poor pawns through various attempts to get rid of them; from rushing them with EMP loaded rifles/shotguns up to mortar spam.
i learned quite a few things that way....

- you can miss with 47~ out of 50 mortar shells, badly.
- EMP is not as good as some people claim, those damn things adapt after the first salvo, always.
- colonist gets hit =colonist dies violently

before i go into more ranting..after countless failures, i researched sniper rifles and had 2 colonists snipe just the Psychic Ship. it did cause the guards to run straight into my base and steam roll everything...but...i survived.somehow.
having rebuild,i was just about to go snipe the Defoliator...when another psychic ship crashed.
i facepalmed and rage quit.

how do you guys manage those..unholy abominations early on?

[Chaoslink]

Never used the CE mod, but dealing with them vanilla, I’d stack up mortar shells near the ship, build sandbags and other forms of cover for my pawns and use tamed animals as literal meat shields by setting a restrictive zone around the area inbetween the ship and my colonists. The mechs usually attack the animals rather than the colonists and a molotov tossed on the mortar shells will set them off to cause significant damage to the ship and mechs. Your mortars can’t miss if they’re right where they need to explode to begin with eh?

Not always the most elegant solution, but when combat often leads to colonist death, I find these tricks work. If available, I’ll also set up automated turrets to harass them. Even when I don’t have them researched, I occasionally scavenge turrets when out on faction missions. If you can cut off their power supply without destroying them, you can take them with you.

[HunterSilver]

Originally posted by Chaoslink:

Never used the CE mod, but dealing with them vanilla,

I apologize but vanilla mechanoids and CE mechanoids are two very different beasts and advice for one does not convey over to the other. CE Mechanoids will absolutely just wipe out a colony that has not been stockpiling special ammo to fight them with. I also don't really use CE so this is why I'm wholly unqualified to give advice on how to deal with them.

[Big [REDACTED] Marty]

dead fall traps are very good vs lancers, and sythers, you'll need quite a few for centi's tho
fire also can work well, molootovs, and stick bombs, ieds are also quite good

[Big [REDACTED] Marty]

KPV aren't exactly early game option, but are quite potent if loaded with AP-I

[Rokko]

Originally posted by Admiral Dugaul:

dead fall traps are very good vs lancers, and sythers, you'll need quite a few for centi's tho
fire also can work well, molootovs, and stick bombs, ieds are also quite good

i kinda didnt think of traps. i tunnel visioned of getting rid of the ships and then deal with the guards. maybe its easier to lure them into trap ridden area. i shall try!

[believor in Prawn]

dont forget you have 88mms, personally though i like to get them into a small area and then introduce them to something called a "flamethrower" since it can bypass armor fully

[believor in Prawn]

Originally posted by Chaoslink:

Never used the CE mod, but dealing with them vanilla, I’d stack up mortar shells near the ship, build sandbags and other forms of cover for my pawns and use tamed animals as literal meat shields by setting a restrictive zone around the area inbetween the ship and my colonists. The mechs usually attack the animals rather than the colonists and a molotov tossed on the mortar shells will set them off to cause significant damage to the ship and mechs. Your mortars can’t miss if they’re right where they need to explode to begin with eh?

Not always the most elegant solution, but when combat often leads to colonist death, I find these tricks work. If available, I’ll also set up automated turrets to harass them. Even when I don’t have them researched, I occasionally scavenge turrets when out on faction missions. If you can cut off their power supply without destroying them, you can take them with you.

when i found my first armored unit in CE it was just a knife dude with a riot shield (think montagne from rainbow six siege) and i was using armor peircing assault rifle ammo, i had to fully destroy his shield (get it to zero hitpoints from the damage it took) before i was able to kill him.

and centipedes and even lancers have more armor than that. your turrets and smgs wont do jackdiddly squat

[Rokko]

Originally posted by believer in prawn:

dont forget you have 88mms, personally though i like to get them into a small area and then introduce them to something called a "flamethrower" since it can bypass armor fully

i did consider the flamethrower option but since flamethrowers have typically a very short range (i think even some shotguns have more than that?) that would spell certain death to anyone trying.
sure you get a burst off and do some damage but the salvo from the heavy charged blaster that is sure to follow would shred anyone standing that close.
my colonists currently wear cloth, not powered armor

[believor in Prawn]

Originally posted by Rokko:

Originally posted by believer in prawn:

dont forget you have 88mms, personally though i like to get them into a small area and then introduce them to something called a "flamethrower" since it can bypass armor fully

i did consider the flamethrower option but since flamethrowers have typically a very short range (i think even some shotguns have more than that?) that would spell certain death to anyone trying.
sure you get a burst off and do some damage but the salvo from the heavy charged blaster that is sure to follow would shred anyone standing that close.
my colonists currently wear cloth, not powered armor

im not saying to charge them, im saying to have them come to you and then use the close range to kill them

also why would you think they could fire the charge blaster before you can fire? ive used this without power armor (i couldnt use power armor because the temeprature was -100c) and it still worked fine against centies

also flamethrowers do tons of damage when you use fully auto mode, like disabled in one burst damage

[Rokko]

@believer in prawn
i have no experience with flamethrowers vs mechanoids so i shall bare that in mind :)
i usually use them to fry raiders

[clarkeveritas]

I'm just now encountering my first centipedes..... not having a fun time. Using CE so i suppose that makes a difference. 2 dropped near me- i used an orbital strike on one and then called in the basic Imperial Strike Team Whatever and let loose with my 14 (armed) colonists. My weapons are mostly Service Rifles, an HMG, quite a few long-range sniper/marksman rifles. I got in a lot of hits from long range but those things just don't stop. I've just come out of a crisis or 3 so i haven't had the manpower to stock up on EMP stuff or make Mortars.... although I AM close to being able to build the higher-level gun emplacement-turret deals and I believe I do have the flak cannon unlocked. Advice? Also- are you guys saying you can get rushed by a LOT of these? Like 10 or more? I'm fairly sure 1 would probably wipe out my whole colony right now and it's not as if I haven't unlocked lots of fun guns and research...... maybe I should have spent more time on weapons research and less on Animal Bionics (poor puppy needed AI-Chip for brain injury..... took a while to research that whole path).

Maybe Incendiary Mortars? Or SUPER-LONG range turrets with Incendiary ammo? Not that I have time to build them for this particular encounter.

[WhoCanItBeNow]

Lure scythers with turrets, in a trap filled box they aggro the nearest enemy so just place some traps along the way, if they reached the turrets, open fire, for lancers and centis and any other large mechs, get an embrasure with walls and stand behind the wall for maximum coverage use antimaterial rifle or flame throwers(if flamethrowers lure them close enough,peek then dont let them shoot by holding fire, if enemy has mortars (unlikely in the first mech raids) then have some bait or call allies, get binos then use the mortars, if you had any.

or do this, tame rats then let the turrets ran out of bullets

[Gen. HugglyPugglyWuggly]

there are a lot of advanced ways to take out mechs but don't forget if your early on in your colony you can just up and leave. Research is really the most important thing early on and if you don't think you can fight something people tend to forget you don't have to. early game vs mechs you want to bee-line for either emp ammo or the 114mm anti-tank rifles, if you don't have manpower so 5+ pawns emp ammo, try to use terrain to draw out the faster mechs and take them out separately then stunlock the centi's it wont work super well but that's mechs for you.

[Rokko]

i hope your last card isnt EMP.
imho its very overrated as they have a high chance to adapt early on,often after the first hit.
and after that,your EMP wont do anything at all to them; see my original post.

[clarkeveritas]

Wait- so FUTURE enemies will adapt or that PARTICULAR enemy will adapt?

Just started building my first sets of Anti-Material Rifles and Charge Sniper Rifles and a few Mortars and Flak Cannons..... but NOW my drunk pets have started using ambrosia so I have to go put out that fire first. These Animal Bionics for liver/brain damage are starting to REALLY be a drain on resources. Have that Animal Logic thing but still: drunk dogs and cats using space-opiates. What an unusual game.