When to build wall defenses

[Very serious person]

What do some of you do?

Tutorials state this should be amongst your first priorities, but I don't see how would I get enough stone bricks to surround the colony that I plan to build.

I mostly find myself in situations where raids are already groups of at least five with firearms without the wall being fully built yet.

What is better to prioritize first regarding defense? The walls? Better guns? Armor? turrets?

[glass zebra]

You don't need to build a wall for you plan. You can just do a quick 20x20 wooden wall around your most important stuff and expand from there. That is kinda how they did is historically and why you find stuff like multiple city walls and inner city stuff etc. Just have one cheap starting wall and if you get the stone, build like a 30x30 around it later.

Wood burns though. But it splits raiders on attack.

[Païtiti]

Originally posted by glass zebra:

You don't need to build a wall for you plan. You can just do a quick 20x20 wooden wall around your most important stuff and expand from there. That is kinda how they did is historically and why you find stuff like multiple city walls and inner city stuff etc. Just have one cheap starting wall and if you get the stone, build like a 30x30 around it later.

Wood burns though. But it splits raiders on attack.

Hm, I disagree. Building a wood wall around your base just invites raiders to set it ablaze. It's not worth the time and effort. The thing is that you dont really need a lot of defenses in the beginning. Even on high difficulty the first raids are weak and can be defended with 1-2 spiketraps that you place in a good spot for example in front of your door. You can easily expand that by building a corridor in front of your door to airlock and have multiple traps in front.

This way you can easily defend the first raids and manhunter packs and concentrate on collecting stone to build the walls you need. Dont build a wood wall, thou. Use wood for spike traps and furniture.

[schnappkatze]

In my recent game I build a gigantic wooden wall around a major part of the map with an opening for a killbox. Raiders usually didn't set it ablaze, they treated it like a stone wall and ran around it into my killbox.

It is not perfect (and a nightmare during dry thunderstorms), but it is far cheaper, earlier and easier to build than a stone wall. My initial plan was to keep the wood wall only in the beginning and do a stone wall later, but it was so effective that I never switched to stone.

One thing I did add when I had the time was to build a massive amount of graves on each side of the wall to prevent the wall from burning when the landscape is burning due to lightning.

[Jaggid Edje]

Early on, I just build some "Defensive positions" rather than worrying about trying to build an actual wall around the base. Basically I just build some wooden barricades and/or sandbags defending the most important things, lay some traps, etc.

To me, it doesn't make sense to build an actual "wall" when you barely have the resources (much less labor time) to get by, especially considering you're just going to expand past that early wall pretty quickly.

I do get sturdy walls up once having enough stone isn't a concern though.

[Cannenses]

To me, the 'build defence' aspect of the tutorial is merely to highlight (not emphasise) the need for countering raiders.

I believe the outsized role of early youtubers explaining killboxes and protective walls had unintended consequence. My view of this 'hunker inside' (whether caves or forts) is nothing more than hype. Other than my first game, I have never used walls to protect my colony, nor killboxes to 'channel' the raiders.

Q: What is better to prioritize first regarding defense? The walls? Better guns? Armor? turrets?
A: I counter raiders by having an open layout, very agile (bionic implant) colonists and a nasty army of predators. They be friendly if not provoked. :-)

At early (still-building) stage of the colony, your map is your best-friend. Trees and legacy structures help provide cover if you want to attack (as a counter to raiders). So, I never chop down every tree, nor deconstruct every legacy structure. In fact, I create new ones. Downed ships provide excellent cover and so I never deconstruct them.

[glass zebra]

Yeah I am kinda getting annoyed every new game with the "Defenses needed" message. Not gonna stand behind a sandbag and get shot at.

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by schnappkatze:

One thing I did add when I had the time was to build a massive amount of graves on each side of the wall to prevent the wall from burning when the landscape is burning due to lightning.

Huh, I never thought of using graves to keep vegetation at bay, I've always used concrete for firebreaks.

[dande48]

I'd say walls are pretty important early on. It's not just for raiders; there's keeping animals out of your crops, predators away from your animals, fires from your base, Thrumbos away from your trees, etc.

I'd also say armor is pretty important. It greatly decreases your chances of losing blood and limbs. I'd rather have good armor and mediocre weapons, that poor armor and good weapons.

[Spartan Delta 27]

Originally posted by Very serious person:

What do some of you do?

Tutorials state this should be amongst your first priorities, but I don't see how would I get enough stone bricks to surround the colony that I plan to build.

I mostly find myself in situations where raids are already groups of at least five with firearms without the wall being fully built yet.

What is better to prioritize first regarding defense? The walls? Better guns? Armor? turrets?

I like using Two Block thick Wooden Walls at chokepoints. They do not get damaged quite as much as you might expect and do great for corralling the Enemy early on.

[Geordy]

Traps are the big winner at the early stages! So walls are more for creating chokepoints for your traps. You could also strategically trap your entrances but you'd need a good feel for what angles the attackers would take.

I like walls and automated defenses. There are so many injuries that maim/disfigure your pawns that avoiding combat is a good idea.

So if you ask me your question Id say beeline for "gun turrets" and let raiders shoot at them instead of your pawns. Every single one of them is worth more than 100 steel(70Steel/30plasteel) and 3 components.

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by Geordy:

You could also strategically trap your entrances but you'd need a good feel for what angles the attackers would take.

When dealing with ranged enemies, you can trap obvious cover points that would be used by the attackers since they'll beeline for them once someone is in range.