Should I start out with or without DLC? [partly newbie to ONI]

[Alexey D]

So I played ONI some time ago but I've never gone far enough with the game, like to rockets and etc. And now there's this new DLC which seems to expand the game a lot.
So the general question is that is it better to start a new playthrough without the DLC or with it? Like, does it change many game mechanics that I'd encounter in the base game and woundn't with the DLC?

[rav]

since the early access dlc is nowhere near feature complete i would suggest to just play the base game.

[PichuYang]

I highly suggest play the base game because DLC includes tweak. However, I would not see that DLC introduces quality of change that enhances the base game. Because if they wanted to do it, it should be done in the base game instead.

And the base game itself has a lot of "weird" mechanic. Washing hands with germy water can remove germs is just one of them. Luckily, base game can be enjoyed without any Workshop items, but Workshop items might be crucial to make full achievement run or generic gameplay more tolerable.

Even mods like give alert sound when Duplicant is "Confined" is appreciated, due to poor AI pathing and lack of warning.

The DLC won't accept mods so far, so keep that in mind.

[Huyen]

Originally posted by CatChu:

I highly suggest play the base game because DLC includes tweak. However, I would not see that DLC introduces quality of change that enhances the base game. Because if they wanted to do it, it should be done in the base game instead.

And the base game itself has a lot of "weird" mechanic. Washing hands with germy water can remove germs is just one of them. Luckily, base game can be enjoyed without any Workshop items, but Workshop items might be crucial to make full achievement run or generic gameplay more tolerable.

Even mods like give alert sound when Duplicant is "Confined" is appreciated, due to poor AI pathing and lack of warning.

The DLC won't accept mods so far, so keep that in mind.

I really hope they bring the base game over to the DLC or the other way around. Like the dlc is now, my first colony colapses because the lack of sustainable power (the rest works fine, 6 dupes sitting on 270.000 kc). I just cant manage 2 colony's at once...

[Shame]

DO NOT play without DLC unless you are playing on Rime (the cold asteroid). And when you do play with the DLC, select the second world start with the Swampy asteroid. Cooling is a ♥♥♥♥♥ in this game, and the game will NEVER teach you how to do it without a cold geyser, so any way to make it easier is a god send. Never play Terra map as a new player, the developers don't know what they are doing when they make this awful asteroid with the layout and geysers that they have. "ideal" conditions my ass for Terra map!

You will either have to look up guides for cooling or quit the game if you try to force your way through the supposedly "ideal" Terra asteroid on either the base game or the DLC. Because heat wilts your plants, so your colony starves, you don't know what to do, it continues to happen over and over and there is nothing you can think of to do about it.

But if you are so stubborn to go for this supposed "ideal" asteroid, or any other even tougher one, find a cold biome for cooling and then rush 2 tons of steel and several kilos of plastic to make a Steam Turbine + Aqua Tuner cooling loop, the former literally deletes heat when drawing in steam.

[cswiger]

I would start without the DLC until I'd played at least a few asteroid types. Certainly Rime is enjoyable change, especially if one has problems managing heat.

PS: You don't need to master aquatuner+steam turbine to play several hundred cycles on a Terra start. Terra asteroids have the Ice biome with AETNs and wheezeworts, which provide long-term cooling in addition to ice which is handy for quickly cooling down a farm or similar.

[John Hadley]

I personally feel like the base game without the DLC is more difficult than playing with the DLC. If you are a more casual player I would recommend playing with the DLC because you will get easier access to more biomes sooner in your game which means more critters, more plants, more options.

The two biomes aside from your starting biome that you have access to quickly in the base game are both kind of annoying to deal with. One has slimelung germs everywhere and the other has a hot climate and is full of chlorine and hydrogen gas that while not really threatening to your duplicants for the most part are inconvenient to deal with since all three hinder the growth of your crops and can drift into your main base area. These annoying biomes cover a much larger area in the base game than the DLC. You still have them in the DLC, but you don't have to go that far to easily find other biomes as well.

[Bokonon]

Originally posted by John Hadley:

I personally feel like the base game without the DLC is more difficult than playing with the DLC. If you are a more casual player I would recommend playing with the DLC because you will get easier access to more biomes sooner in your game which means more critters, more plants, more options.

Maybe for an experienced player but for a beginner I'd recommend vanilla. It's tough enough to keep up with one base if you're new but to be forced to build at least a second base (because of lack of materials) is pretty rough. Vanilla worlds give you everything you need in one big place so a newer player can focus on building and maintaining one base versus multiple in the DLC. Just my take, YMMV.

[Shame]

Originally posted by Bokonon:

Originally posted by John Hadley:

I personally feel like the base game without the DLC is more difficult than playing with the DLC. If you are a more casual player I would recommend playing with the DLC because you will get easier access to more biomes sooner in your game which means more critters, more plants, more options.

Maybe for an experienced player but for a beginner I'd recommend vanilla. It's tough enough to keep up with one base if you're new but to be forced to build at least a second base (because of lack of materials) is pretty rough. Vanilla worlds give you everything you need in one big place so a newer player can focus on building and maintaining one base versus multiple in the DLC. Just my take, YMMV.

How does a cool slush geyser and a cool salty slush geyser in the DLC not give you everything you could possibly need for a decent amount of duplicants? On one planetoid nonetheless! Having everything nearby doesn't mean much if your colony is starving due to plants wilting and heat being inevitably near impossible to overcome for a new player. You don't need oil or atmo suits if the 2 geysers you have give you everything you could possibly need.

[melia_romulans]

I would also recommend sticking with just the base game, agreeing with the comments others have made, but also - from what I remember about the Early Access of the base game, it was somewhat common for updates to nerf your base and force you to start over. Given the learning curve of the game, I would recommend sticking with the stable code branch. There are also far more tutorials about establishing stable bases for the base game than the evolving exploration mechanics of the DLC.

[Huyen]

Originally posted by Shame:

Originally posted by Bokonon:

Maybe for an experienced player but for a beginner I'd recommend vanilla. It's tough enough to keep up with one base if you're new but to be forced to build at least a second base (because of lack of materials) is pretty rough. Vanilla worlds give you everything you need in one big place so a newer player can focus on building and maintaining one base versus multiple in the DLC. Just my take, YMMV.

How does a cool slush geyser and a cool salty slush geyser in the DLC not give you everything you could possibly need for a decent amount of duplicants? On one planetoid nonetheless! Having everything nearby doesn't mean much if your colony is starving due to plants wilting and heat being inevitably near impossible to overcome for a new player. You don't need oil or atmo suits if the 2 geysers you have give you everything you could possibly need.

You need the oil to make plastic for a steam turbine...not to mention the other uses when you run out of coal because you need to cool your water with 1200w/h.

[Hyperion]

Originally posted by Huyen:

lack of sustainable power

Lots of duplicants on hamster wheels? Huge Hatch farms?

[Huyen]

Originally posted by HyperKnight:

Originally posted by Huyen:

lack of sustainable power

Lots of duplicants on hamster wheels? Huge Hatch farms?

I'd like my dupes to do other stuff like building a rocket, without having them running days in a row just to keep my plants cooled.