What weapons do you usually equip your colonists with?

[Terripan]

So I know that there have been a few posts before that have pretty much asked this question, but using the search function I couldn't find any of them and as far as I know there hasn't been one since at least 1.2, possibly since 1.1. So since the meta has probably changed a little since then, and since there are probably more/different users here now, I figured I might as well ask.

So the title is fairly self-explanatory. What weapons/armor do you usually give your colonists?

I think this may be a little unusual, but I typically try to avoid melee at all costs. The only circumstances where I'll give a pawn a melee weapon are pretty rare:
1) a pawn is a brawler
2) there are no guns available
3) a pawn has almost no skill in shooting, but is practically a god in melee and has at least a minor passion for it
This means that I only ever have a few melee pawns, and they are pretty much used to carry away injured pawns or to chase retreating raiders. Sometimes they are used to protect shooters from a melee charge.

As far as guns go, I try to get machine guns, in particular the machine pistol, the heavy SMG, and the assault rifle. Low skill shooters get machine pistols, since they put out a large amount of bullets(even with a lower chance to hit per bullet than other weapons, like the boltie, the amount it puts out makes up for it. This is my philosophy on fighting in the game in general), heavy SMGs are given to medium skill shooters, and assault rifles are given to high skill shooters. If I lack heavy SMGs or assault rifles, they can be substituted with machine pistols, LMGs, or bolt action rifles, but the latter is reserved for high skill shooters.

[Slye_Fox]

Zweihanders for the melee guys, Charge LMGs for the close-mid range guys & Railguns for snipers.

[HunterSilver]

Persona Monoswords whenever possible and Persona Zeushammers if monoswords aren't available. One non-psychic melee colonist can jump into enemy broad shields and clear them out for you to use. Against mechanoids, one non-psychic melee colonist is usually good to take down 3 or 4 centipedes on their own before they need to fall back due to bruises. With psychic powers, especially skip and invisibility, a melee colonist can cleave through entire armies.

I usually try to keep 9 colonists with assault rifles, and eventually charge rifles, to take advantage of enemy broad shields and killboxes. Guns sure are a thing that exist. Their damage output is fine, but they can't take advantage of a lot of the best psychic powers like bullet shield and instead rely on cover or broad shields. I end up having to stick gunners in cataphract armor asap so they can survive larger fire fights.

Meanwhile melee units can sport grenadier armor pretty safely. Those grenades do something like 63 damage unmitigated, so even when their damage is blocked they blow off limbs and otherwise kill raiders in a large radius. Unfortunately, because of how beneficial it is to give them psychic powers, they will eventually move into prestige cataphract armor with a jetpack.

[Sugar Show]

Uranium spear, easy the best weapon go early and as end game.

[Cannenses]

Obviously your options is dependent on which stage of the game. And your team size, to generate wealth & crafting better guns.

For later stage, or higher (starred) quests, what you’ve listed is probably not enough. They’ll be outgunned by industrial-level raiders.

Short-range is either brawlers with persona monoswords & jump packs to close the distance quickly, or chain shotgun.

Mid- and long-range is assault gun, charge rifle, charge lance and snipers (2 max). I don’t use bolt action, they are too slow & single shot. Distance clearly not better than snipers.

Not normally discussed is the build quality, which in my experience is a game-changer. If you can equip your pawns with Masterwork guns at the minimum, you will see a clear difference in a firefight. Legendary charge rifles, although somewhat shorter range, is absolutely lethal if you have high level pawns (15 & above). Use jump pack to get in range quickly when necessary.

Finally, the Royalty DLC has Private Military Contractors (as well as different types) for pawns with Count/Countess title. Used appropriately (timing & location of drop), the raiding party is pinched in a killbox. No one leaves the map.

[Terripan]

Originally posted by Cannenses:

Obviously your options is dependent on which stage of the game. And your team size, to generate wealth & crafting better guns.

For later stage, or higher (starred) quests, what you’ve listed is probably not enough. They’ll be outgunned by industrial-level raiders.

Well my current strategy definitely worked well in 1.1, but I'm not so sure about 1.1 with Royalty installed or 1.2, since I actually haven't really had a serious game since I finished a game that I started when 1.1 was experimental(I started it before Royalty dropped, but I finished it after Royalty came out. I didn't buy Royalty until I finished that game).

I beat that game by traveling to the landed ship, but just loading up a save and taking a brief look, it looks like by the time I was at the landed ship, I had completely upgraded from machine pistols to at least heavy SMGs, most of which were normal quality. The lowest shooting skill of a ranged pawn was 7, and the highest was 15. It looks like the average skill was about 10 or so, maybe a little lower. Out of my 12 colonists, 8 were equipped with recon armor(the lowest quality was normal, but many were good or excellent. I even had 1 legendary suit), 1 was equipped with marine armor, and the remainder had armor vests.

On Cass Classic Rough, I only managed to lose 2 colonists, neither of which I lost defending the ship(though both died in combat. 1 was killed by a lancer, and the other was one-shotted by a pirate). I didn't cheat in any way either, meaning I didn't reload, use dev mode, and the game was 100% vanilla. So I would say that that loadout, despite being relatively light compared to a lot of others I've heard of, managed to work wonders. It's also important to note that that loadout was my endgame loadout, earlier on everything was worse: I had minimal armor, lower skills, less bionics(though at the end I only had a token amount), and for most of the game I was using mostly machine pistols.

Really, the main problem is that I haven't played many serious games where I've gotten very far since that game, so I don't know if that strategy is still as good as it was. However, I imagine that the Locust armor could be a good way to flank raiders and hamper retreats.

[Twelvefield]

There is something equally satisfying yet disturbing when three or four colonists with lower-end shooting skills all decide to go at the same time to hunt squirrels with assault rifles.

[Neopolitan]

I like to have one or two pawns (two if I have 10+ people total) equipped with a persona monosword, high level shield belt, and the jetpack armor. extremely useful at jumping behind enemy frontlines, stabbing all their snipers to death, and then jumping back to safety. Also useful for killing enemies armed with doomsday weapons.

[gimmethegepgun]

Uranium warhammers for melees. If it's Excellent or better it deals enough damage with the head attack to kill a human regardless of where it hits them (hitting a limb will destroy the limb and usually cleave into the torso, which it will also destroy).

Just make sure you don't accidentally use them to pacify berserk pawns. At best they're going to be missing limb(s) when it's over.

Originally posted by Sugar Show:

Uranium spear, easy the best weapon go early and as end game.

Plasteel is MUCH better for sharp weapons than uranium. It deals the same amount of damage with sharp attacks but attacks way faster.

[Ponypony]

Longswords and revolvers!

I got a quest that gave a legendary and a masterwork revolver and they seem to kick ass, high rate of fire and good damage. But i am not very far in

[Neopolitan]

Originally posted by Trademark2:

Longswords and revolvers!

I got a quest that gave a legendary and a masterwork revolver and they seem to kick ass, high rate of fire and good damage. But i am not very far in

Very early legendary and masterwork weapons of basic weapons are very good. You'll find that you can use that weapon until you can create your own good+ lategame weapons. And even late game I just let my people who don't fight as much use it for self defense

[frumple]

maces for melee, snipers when kiting annoying centipedes, heavy SMGs for short range ambushes or low skill pawns. Machine pistols are nice for them too. Assault rifles and bolt rifles see some use too.
I do not use grenades and while i like deadfall traps, they take an ice age to build and are not worth anyone's time right now.

It does depend on the environment. I like to build bunkers that have a single entrance into a lit room. This room is separated by a wall from the second part of the building and this wall has two autodoors and a central block in the middle. This allows 5 pawns to shoot through the two doors, from their dark room into the brightly lit one. A second row of 5 pawns can stand behind them for a total of 10 guns, mostly short range, dealing damage very quickly. Two melee colonists with shields stand in the autodoors and keep them open. If the enemy is too numerous, i'll try to move to another bunker or a different position, or draw their attention away.

Such a setup is completely different from fighting in the open or over long range. Generally i prefer short cooldown even if it means low range and low power. By designing the buildings we fight in, i can try and limit the penalties of fighting up close and personal.

Open combat seems to be the dirt worst. Try and get close, hit hard, and get out. The enemy has the advantage of not having to care whether they live or die, but you and i have the advantage of being able to lay down walls and affect enemy pathing. This is very helpful in breaking up large mobs (fastest enemies easily separate from the slowpokes), and matters more than which actual firearms are used.

[Burki from Turki]

Melee weaponry;
1- Pawn is a warden, automatically carries maces because there's a chance that prison breaks may happen while he's interacting with prisoners and bleeding prisoners is not a good thing at all.
2- Pawn has excellent melee skill and excellent traits for it (such as Warrior of the Sun from MpT).

Ranged;
1- Pawn has good/decent/bad/excellent shooting B)
2- Pawn has health conditions that would give him a hard time in melee combats but not in range combats (eg; leg injuries that decrease melee dogde chance)

[MortVent]

Early game: clubs for melee (wood or cheap stone I'm not using for construction ), best ranged I can give them (recurve bows for primitive, shotguns for average shooters and bolt action for good shooters)

Mid game : maces for melee (steel), chain shotguns and assault rifles for the ranged

late game: Uranium Warhammers (or psi weapons) for the melee, and then the best ranged weapons possible (though tend to keep some chain shotguns around for the low skill ones)

[Sugar Show]

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

Plasteel is MUCH better for sharp weapons than uranium. It deals the same amount of damage with sharp attacks but attacks way faster.

Unless if you're using the infamous mod "Combat extended" then ever penetration number is more important factor than the damage outcome.

[Markus Reese]

I have a staging room with an armory where I have them grab according to the raid.

DPS is a bit of a trap. Strength and penetrating power is very important. A bunch of light smgs or minigun can just shred an insect hive or tribal attack, but happily ping off a bunch of centipedes or armored up pirates where great bows and pilas will cause serious harm.

Same with grenades etc. I like to have protected up melee people for the purpose of intercepting high priority threats like heavy weaponry or explosives and to protect gunners if melee people with high strength weapons get through