User:Hordes/Weapons Guide

There are a wide variety of weapons availale in RimWorld. Using them effectively can give you a sizable advantage against raiders.

Melee

You shall not pass.

Melee weapons specialize in hand-to-hand combat.

Pawns who are adjacent to each other are forced into melee combat, even if they are wielding a shotgun. A gun's barrel is quite ineffective compared to a sword. Melee lends itself well to disruptive tactics, like rushing down a sniper or grenadier, or peeling off enemies from your gunners. The melee block - create a chokepoint with 3 melee outside, where only 1 enemy can melee at a time - is extremely effective. You can have gunners fire just behind them.

The main con with melee is that damage is unavoidable. Later in the game, enemies will vastly outnumber you, especially on higher difficulties; a 200 tribal raid will eventually wear down your most well-geared melee fighters, even in the best scenarios. The second con is that melee in open combat actually has to approach ranged fighters, meaning it quickly becomes weak in those situations. Animals will always fight back against a melee weapon, even against a 0% manhunter, making them terrible for hunting.

Notes:

Raw DPS is the primary concern, as there's no accuracy or range to worry about.
- Weapon quality and material has a large impact on any weapon's effectiveness.
- Give your best melee pawns the strongest melee weapons, assuming you desire to get into melee at all.
Shield belts are invaluable to give protection against bullets. They give melee pawns a new use, to serve as powerful distractions.
Try to avoid using melee in the very early game; ranged weapons and spike traps are stronger than the weaker melee choices.

Sharp

Monoswords are the strongest sharp weapon.
Plasteel longswords are the best craftable sharp weapon.

Sharp weapons are the bread and butter of melee weapons. They are the most common type of melee, dealing strong all-round damage.

Comparisons:
A masterwork plasteel longsword will outdamage a good monosword (though has less AP). A plasteel knife is roughly on par with a steel longsword of the same quality. The next best weapons from longswords are spears and gladiuses. Faster weapons (like knives) have some niche to training melee.

Blunt

Zeushammers are the strongest blunt weapon. They also cause a small amount of EMP, stunning turrets and mechanoids.
Uranium maces are the best craftable blunt weapon, and 2nd best overall.
- Uranium warhammers are better against armor, but 3x as expensive.

Blunt wounds do not bleed, are much less likely to destroy limbs, and blunt weapons are often weaker in DPS than their sharp counterparts. However, blunt weapons are great for penetrating armor, as most armor protects poorly against it. They also have a small chance to stun for 45 ticks (0.75 secs) on hit. In addition, non-bleeding can help with capturing prisoners. Note that enemies have a Death on Down chance from pain, so this does not increase capture rate by a lot. Weaker blunt weapons can help supress berserking pawns.

Comparisons:
In terms of raw damage, zeushammers lose to monoswords until facing foes in marine armor. Even centipedes don't have the Sharp% armor to resist a monosword. Maces lose to longswords until facing flak vest-level armor, and longswords can still harm the unarmored areas of the body better. Like with monoswords and longswords, a masterwork uranium mace can beat a good zeushammer.

Body parts

Power claws are the strongest melee body part, but lowers Moving by 8%.

Artificial body parts can be used while holding a gun. Fulfilling the role of a sidearm, these implements are weaker than dedicated melee weapons. You can put these on your frontline gunners, who may not always be able to supress combatants in melee. These parts can slightly increase damage in melee; due to the melee verb system, sometimes the fists / body parts will be used as a weapon.

Creating these bionics is an advanced technology, so they are usually reserved for the mid- to late- game. Body parts can also be bought, though the surgery can be a bottleneck if you don't have a good doctor. Also note that pawns will prioritize their "best" melee attack; only one part is required.

Comparisons:
Power claws are roughly equal to a normal plasteel longsword. Hand talons are stronger than elbow blades, which are stronger than a knee spike, though knee spikes have more AP. All three are roughly on-par with a normal steel longsword. Note that combat parts are incompatible with other artifical parts: hand attachments get in the way of a field hand, hand / arm attachments don't work with a bionic arm, and knee spikes don't work with a bionic leg. Venom talons are the weakest of the bunch, but do not occupy any useful area of the body.

Melee - Nonhuman

Animal

Thrumbos are the best animal, but are notoriously difficult to tame and keep tame.
Megasloths, elephants, rhinos, and both bears are behind the thrumbo, but can be found in the wild.

Animals are much more expendible than a colonist, and most have a lot more health than a colonist. However, they cannot be drafted, limiting their combat use severely. They thus have 2 main uses:

Animals trained in Attack can... attack. They will rush towards nearby enemies, acting as a powerful distraction for your gunners.
Animals can be put in an allowed area in a hallway raiders are passing through. Raiders and the animal will be forced to attack each other, resulting in a melee block scenario. Pen animals will not be attacked by raiders, and in any case are unable to be zoned.

Animals require one or multiple pawns proficient in the Animals skill in order be tamed and trained. Animal selection is also limited by biome, and large animals can turn hostile in failed taming attempts.

Wild animals

There are three dedicated ways to make wild animals hostile to your enemies:

Psychic animal pulser is a single use item that turns all wild animals on the map manhunter. Wall in doors (to prevent exit via mental break) and watch the carnage - this item can easily end smaller raids, or at least force sieges to attack.
The manhunter pulse psycast turns all animals in a large, 57-tile radius into manhunters. Reusable.
The animal warcall gene turns a specific animal hostile against your opponents.

All three weapons depend heavily on your maps's current fauna. Also, all three become progressively weaker as raids become stronger; an elephant can't handle 30 gun-wielding raiders, for instance.

Mechanoid

Scythers are the most effective at melee combat.

Mechanoids have all the advantages of being an animal, but then some, including the ability to be drafted like a colonist. Mechs can be repaired of all damage for just the cost of power and can be resurrected for a couple of steel. This negates all the long-term problems that lategame melee faces (though mechs are, of course, not invincible).

Mechs have their unique costs. They require their mechanitor nearby to actually control. They cost bandwidth, which could have been used for any amount of ranged mechs. And they create toxic wastepacks, which will eventuallyy pollute your landscape. As combat mechs can be turned off, the actual costs of power and pollution are rather limited.

Comparisons
Scythers (2 bandwidth) are the strongest and most effective at melee, and move slightly faster than a baseline human. Tunnelers (3 bandwidth) have twice the armor of a scyther and a natural 250 HP shield belt, but are much slower and don't do as much damage. Tunnelers can also mine. Centipedes (4) and mechanoid commanders (5) have similar armor to the tunneler, and have much higher actual health, though are mainly used for ranged combat.