Rimworld: The Set-Up

I mentioned it briefly in the update post, but I figured it would be better to go into more detail here about what I am actually planning in the setup post. Hence, here we are! Rimworld was an obvious first choice; I've done a written let's play for it a couple of times before, yet it was always the formatting that I could never quite get right where I wanted. Luckily, I have a better idea for that now.

The Format

First off, I'll separate off each in-game day, not entirely sure how many days will be in each post though I'll aim for at least seven and maybe go as high as ten. I'll see how it goes when I actually write it as the longer each individual part the longer it will take for new content to go up (always a balancing act for any content creator I suspect.)

Secondly, aside from the in-character/in-world perspective of events that forms the bulk of the actual story, I'll try and include like cut-out text boxes for game mechanics, things I learned or general game stuff that wouldn't fit that context which leads nicely toward another related idea: Objective lists.

So, the third element of this new format as mentioned above will be setting myself objectives and clearly defining them. It will mostly be for clarity, though it should also mean I don't always have to always use story or exposition to explain everything. Also helps to keep me relatively organised. Leading to the actual set-up where I won't stop the story at a failed run, I'll label each post like: Colony 1, Part 1 or something.

The Actual Set-up

Now, with that out of the way, I am likely to do more than one colony run. If one fails, I examine what went wrong, plan accordingly, and set up the next one. Less pressure on me for perfection every time, plus it also means I only stop when I want to do another game as a story let's play. Hopefully, the explainers I insert might even help others enjoy the game more, too!

I did a couple of test games and installed the following mods, mainly quality-of-life things, any additional mods will be listed if I install them in between runs:

• Harmony (A lot of mods use it, so it's a given)

• Adaptive Storage Framework (Used for 2 other mods I have installed)

• [sbz] Fridge (As storing and keeping food cold was a consistent headache)

• Bluelibra's Resource Crates (Just to make storage a bit neater looking and easier to manage)

• Camera+ (For screenshots mostly!)

First things first, with the mods done, the AI Storyteller for this first run will be Cassandra Classic, if this gets popular, people can vote on these and maybe even the difficulty later on. Speaking of which, the difficulty will be initially set to Adventure Story and commitment mode. This will also be the 'Crashlanded' scenario. I don't want it to be too easy as I fear I won't learn anything and I have played in the past so it seems a good place to start. Later on I will up it if it seems I start doing really well, as unlikely as that seems right now. World seed is tarpit if you wanted to generate it yourself, and everything else is set to default for now.

The initial colony will be in a temperate forest zone, and as I get more comfortable, I can try more challenging biomes. Taking this approach feels like a better choice, the Boreal Forest biome was tempting for the harsher winters, but maybe only if I survive long enough to feel like I have learned how to get a sizeable colony going in a temperate area first. I chose a large hills area with slate and sandstone and a 30 day growing period. That will hopefully make it easier to keep everyone fed without relying on hunting and berry picking.

The (Un)lucky Few!

Hermine Freeman is the first one, passion for construction, albeit a low skill of 4 though that will change quickly, I suspect. Passion for intellectual too and a decent score of 10, same as crafting, which she has a burning passion for, so she feels like a solid first pick to me. No combat skills so both of the others will definitely need to pick up the slack.

Ara Yagami is next, burning passion for both plants and medicine, with decent shooting skills makes her a solid pick as she'll be responsible for the crops and helping patch people up. Greedy and Gourmand traits might be tricky to work around, but hopefully being in a temperate zone means we should be able to keep her well-fed. While she can do anything, she has no building or mining skills at all.

Sjoerd 'Bowman' Lukas is the final pick after more rerolls than I'd care to admit. She rounds out the starting trio nicely, I think. Burning passion and a crazy skill for shooting at 13 means she'll be using the hunting rifle. Solid melee skill too at 7 with basic passion for it. She also has a basic passion for cooking and plants albeit with low skills, she's definitely the best cook. Intellectual of 13 means there should be very few lulls in research, which will help. She is greedy too, and incapable of caring jobs. So, I have the basics to get going yet a few skill gaps to address.

So, with the colonists selected, their crash landing onto the Rimworld sees the start of our adventure. Will they survive and thrive? Will disaster loom around every corner? Will they simply fade away or go down in a blaze of glory against an army of raiders or mechanoids? Well, let's find out together and enjoy the adventure along the way!

Also note that each part of the let's play should have its own link in the relevant section of the site so you can easily read it all without having to dig around too much.