How am i supposed to beat this?

[Tabasco]

Hi,
i got a Ferried Ancient Compound Relic Quest (1 Star) where i have to hack 9 terminals.
I had to send 21 Pawns to it and the quest says there is an unknown threat and Neanderthals are Exploring it.
It's not a normal Caravan so i couldn't take my ghouls, mechanoids or more food/medicine to this complex but normaly they aren't really tough.

But HOLY MOLY: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3396304847

I counted 46 Centipedes, 19 Lancer, 16 Scythers, 15 Scorcher, 15 Tesserons, 27 Militors and 14 Pikeman. The Centipedes alone costs more than 18 k Raid points. All Together more than 30 k Raid points.
If you go through the doors ---> Bomb Explodes and Mechanoids wake up
If you hack the Terminals ------> Bomb Explodes and Mechanoids wake up.

After hacking all Terminals i got a raid with 192 ! Neanderthals.
The only way for me to win this was through hardcore savescumming, knocking through the walls and stealth to the terminals which didn't trigger the bombs.

My Pawns are really good equipped, all Weapons Masterwork and Legendary, Good Genes and armor. Even on my Colonymap with killzone, Mortars, Ghouls and friendly Mechanoids i would have some struggle to kill 46 Centipedes. But on a Temporary map without Firewalls or food? And don't forget the mental breaks from standing too long in the cold.

How am i supposed to win this ONE STAR QUEST on first try/Hardcore?

[Triple G]

Without reading the thread i´d say that this would be a good use for a neuroquake - maybe two for the 192 neanderthals. It would defeat the raid completely, and You would only need to fight some centipedes.

Else i personally go room by room, so i wouldn´t even realize that there are so many on the map at the same time, till i discover them. Probably having the one or other zeushammer would be advantageous. And with 21 people some probably have insanity lances or low shield packs and whatnot.

Also i suggest to get more charge rifles. Like they have more armor penetration. And at close range like in these complexes - chain shotguns are good. You will not make much use of the assault rifles there - as these are about the range advantage. Heavy SMG is good for close range, but the other options are better. Having a guy with EMP grenades could be a good idea.

Else: ye - i would probably also need to reload the one or other time.

[Veylox]

At some point these missions just outscale you to the point where there's no point trying. Just spam them early on and forget about them later, or just be ready to leave at any point, with significant injuries

[WildStargazer]

Originally posted by Veylox:

At some point these missions just outscale you to the point where there's no point trying. Just spam them early on and forget about them later, or just be ready to leave at any point, with significant injuries

With DLCs you can create god-like pawns that can deal with such enemy scales without problems, especially with Royalty, but in game without DLCs situation can be tough.

[Ninefinger]

Originally posted by Radiosity:

Seems like you allowed your colony wealth to get a wee bit out of control :)

This is why I like the idea to play with wealth mode off although I have not tried it yet and this way you are encouraged to progress as fast as possible to stay ahead of the increasing difficulty and you can gain as much wealth as you can muster to bolster your progress but idk

[Tabasco]

Originally posted by Astasia:

The difficulty range of quests has increased significantly in 1.5 from what I have seen, it's like there's a second hidden multiplier on them of ~x0.3 to x3.0, which is further multiplied by the star rating. So they can take that 10k threat you have and throw something like 30k at you even at 1 star, but then the next quest might be like kill 3 centipedes or something equally ridiculous in the other direction. It's fun though, just if it doesn't list the enemies you are facing in a quest go into it with a lot of caution, and use the reward as a gauge when you can because that also scales with the points of the quest. If the rewards are normally like 20k for something you can handle, and a quest reward is worth 60k, it might be a bit rough.

Hey Astasia, nice to read you here. Read a lot of your posts here about the rimworld mechanics.
I made an Excel sheet to calculate the raid points approximately and the raids, even with quests are in that range. i never witnessed more raidpoints than 10 k per Star.

Originally posted by solitarystargazer:

I think it is some mod at fault, even on maxed raid points you can't get that much centipedes. Still, if your pawns have high hacking speed you can avoid most of the fight even when centipedes wake up.

Its definetely no mod fault. I play pure Vanilla.

Originally posted by Triple G:

Without reading the thread i´d say that this would be a good use for a neuroquake - maybe two for the 192 neanderthals. It would defeat the raid completely, and You would only need to fight some centipedes.

The Neanderthals spawns only after hacking the terminals. Even room by room that many Mechanoids made massive problems for me.

Originally posted by Triple G:

Also i suggest to get more charge rifles. Like they have more armor penetration. And at close range like in these complexes - chain shotguns are good. You will not make much use of the assault rifles there - as these are about the range advantage. Heavy SMG is good for close range, but the other options are better. Having a guy with EMP grenades could be a good idea.

I didn't expect such a Threat, i just send some colonists to kill some neanderthals and mechanoids or bugs. Not a 30k+ raid. At my first try i even just walked into the complex without any care.

[Veylox]

Originally posted by solitarystargazer:

Originally posted by Veylox:

At some point these missions just outscale you to the point where there's no point trying. Just spam them early on and forget about them later, or just be ready to leave at any point, with significant injuries

With DLCs you can create god-like pawns that can deal with such enemy scales without problems, especially with Royalty, but in game without DLCs situation can be tough.

How would royalty help here ? I'm pretty sure you're getting beat up pretty badly even with high-end gear in this situation, plus these maps tend to have massive reinforcement just to make sure you die for good in case you beat the actual complex

I assumed they woke up all at once if you hit the first one, maybe I'm misremembering, if they keep sleeping then room by room might be doable cleanly if you have crazy damage and enough EMP

[Tabasco]

Originally posted by Reeva!:

You got any anti-grain warheads at base? If you do, pod it to this place and select the centre for the pod, this'll allow you to pick a specific location, unlike podding to the edge. Get it in a good spot and figure out how to detonate it.

If you got any explosives that deal blunt damage, it'll work, antigrain's just the best. Chemfuel's useless, but could create a trail of fire to set off warheads, if you got enough pods, and a way to get to the doors to stay open, it's gonna be tactical no matter what with that many mechanoids.

Otherwise, if you're confident, set up some stonecutters and start bricking, make a little killbox, beat the snot out of them, pod over some Go-Juice and any other drug that might help. Be a gamer and pop some luciferium ;)

The location was far more than 60 Tiles away from my colony, so no droppods here.
Additionally if i would use antigrain warheads i would destroy the terminals i needed to hack and fail the quest.

Stone cutting needs time, i had no time because there where no food and i couldn't make a caravan there.

Originally posted by Veylox:

How would royalty help here ? I'm pretty sure you're getting beat up pretty badly even with high-end gear in this situation, plus these maps tend to have massive reinforcement just to make sure you die for good in case you beat the actual complex

I think he means the Psycasts. I got some Psycasts but i rarely use it. Sometimes the teleportation or the Water puddle thingy but i think there are a lot more useful skills i didn't use correctly.

Originally posted by Veylox:

I assumed they woke up all at once if you hit the first one, maybe I'm misremembering, if they keep sleeping then room by room might be doable cleanly if you have crazy damage and enough EMP

Only one room wakes up if they get disturbed, but if something like fire spreads through the steel walls the nex room wakes up and so one. It can easily overwhelming.

[MadArtillery]

Originally posted by Tabasco:

Originally posted by Reeva!:

You got any anti-grain warheads at base? If you do, pod it to this place and select the centre for the pod, this'll allow you to pick a specific location, unlike podding to the edge. Get it in a good spot and figure out how to detonate it.

If you got any explosives that deal blunt damage, it'll work, antigrain's just the best. Chemfuel's useless, but could create a trail of fire to set off warheads, if you got enough pods, and a way to get to the doors to stay open, it's gonna be tactical no matter what with that many mechanoids.

Otherwise, if you're confident, set up some stonecutters and start bricking, make a little killbox, beat the snot out of them, pod over some Go-Juice and any other drug that might help. Be a gamer and pop some luciferium ;)

The location was far more than 60 Tiles away from my colony, so no droppods here.
Additionally if i would use antigrain warheads i would destroy the terminals i needed to hack and fail the quest.

Stone cutting needs time, i had no time because there where no food and i couldn't make a caravan there.

Originally posted by Veylox:

How would royalty help here ? I'm pretty sure you're getting beat up pretty badly even with high-end gear in this situation, plus these maps tend to have massive reinforcement just to make sure you die for good in case you beat the actual complex

I think he means the Psycasts. I got some Psycasts but i rarely use it. Sometimes the teleportation or the Water puddle thingy but i think there are a lot more useful skills i didn't use correctly.

Originally posted by Veylox:

I assumed they woke up all at once if you hit the first one, maybe I'm misremembering, if they keep sleeping then room by room might be doable cleanly if you have crazy damage and enough EMP

Only one room wakes up if they get disturbed, but if something like fire spreads through the steel walls the nex room wakes up and so one. It can easily overwhelming.

What you really need is vertigo pulse (lvl3) to really do some damage. The berserk stuff is pretty good too and on the smaller scales stun and beckon can do a lot of work. Skip can not be underestimated of course. Just teleport enemies into a melee beatdown squad over and over. Psi casts are very strong, An army of mechs isn't much danger if they aren't shooting you and just walking in circles instead.

[Astasia]

Originally posted by Veylox:

How would royalty help here ?

Skip shield and persona zeus hammers mostly, and legendary cataphract as a fallback. If you want to feel overpowered and kill them all yourself.

Or berserk pulse to just get it done quickly. A handful of pawns casting berserk pulse into those packed little rooms at the same time would have made it a cakewalk.

[WildStargazer]

Originally posted by Veylox:

How would royalty help here ?

Persona weapons and psycasts, also more bionics and the most protective power armor. Additionally if you set up mortar battery somewhere on the edge of the map you can pound mechs with EMP shells, they have large effect radius. That will make things more easy, I often deal in this way with mech breach raids. And if nothing works you can just build a little killbox and take a battle there, that would make things very easy, because the main power of killbox is that enemies go in it one by one and not all at once.

[Jet]

orbitals the only way to deal with bs. maybe thatd kill em

[Veylox]

"I think he means the Psycasts. I got some Psycasts but i rarely use it. Sometimes the teleportation or the Water puddle thingy but i think there are a lot more useful skills i didn't use correctly."

You kinda want to use berserk pulse but psycasters are annoying to accomodate and they're kinda cooked after the first or second cast