Crashed ship parts

Crashed ship parts drop as part of a map Event. A crashed ship part, accompanied by small fires if the surrounding tiles support fire, lands at a random unroofed location when the event triggers. These ship parts carry one of two negative effects, "psychic" or "defoliator".

In order to remove the effect, the ship part must be destroyed; but, predictably, it's not just as simple as that...

Summary

Ship parts

For details on each specific ship part, see ship part (defoliator) and ship part (psychic droner).

Mechanoids

Manually putting out nearby fires does not awaken the sleeping mechanoids.

A ship part and its escort, just before hitting the ground.

Planned defenses close to a crashed ship part. The "no build" zone around the mech is highlighted in red.

A group of mechanoids will land along the ship to defend it. The size and composition of the group is defined by raid points. They will spawn in a dormant state, and will awaken only if they or the ship take damage, or if a player-built structure is placed too close to any sleeping mechanoid. Once awakened, they will usually stand around towards the right side of the ship part. Objects partially blocking that area may cause the mechs to choose another side to idle on. Unless pursuing nearby targets, they will only move about 30 tiles away before returning to the ship part, and not all will move as a unit to chase a threat. Once the ship part is destroyed, however, all remaining mechanoids will switch to attack like a normal raid.

As long as nothing is damaged or anything is built within any 5x5 area centered on each mechanoid, colonists can freely move, work, and even fight nearby fires without disturbing the mechanoids. Since mechanoids are immune to fire, these initial fires will not damage or wake them. Pawns set to Flee from danger will flee from sleeping mechanoids, but those set to Attack will not do so until they awaken.

Loot

Obtainable loot includes resources yielded by destroying the ship part and processing the defeated mechanoid corpses and any slag chunks they might drop.

The ship part itself will always drop:

•  4 steel slag chunk.
•  60 steel.
•  10 plasteel.
•  1 component.
•  1 advanced component.

Analysis

For commentary on each specific ship part, see ship part (defoliator) and ship part (psychic droner).

Objects placed or built outside of the "no build zone" will not affect it, so, if the threat is not immediate (i.e. the negative mood or plant-killing can be endured for the time being), the colony can build defenses prior to triggering the ship. IEDs and spike traps can also be placed around the mechanoids and ship part to deal damage to them upon awakening.

Because of defending mechanoids' tendency to stay near the ship part, pawns equipped with sniper rifles can "kite" the defenders from a safe distance. This is done by advancing to fire at mechs around the ship part, retreating before they come close enough to shoot back, and advancing again once they return to the ship part. This is particularly effective against most mechs, who will not engage in combat unless they spot a target within their pursue range of around 30 tiles. This means bolt-action and sniper rifles can safely take out mechanoids without retaliation. Caution should be taken if Centurions, Diaboli or War queens are present , as their charge blaster turret matches the sniper rifle's range and will fire at any target even if the wielding mech itself is not actively engaged in combat.

Waiting for passerby traders or raiders to engage the ship may be a viable strategy for colonies without access to stronger technologies such as mortars. However, the mechanoids must be woken up first by damaging the ship or building in the ship's vicinity.

There is a strategy involving the doorshot technique that can help immensely with ship parts:

1. Build a long wall on one side of the ship with a short corridor protruding outwards with a door at the end. This shape limits line of sight for the mechs while executing the strategy. Wall stuff is not important, cheap and fast to build materials like wood are recommended.
2. Draft a colonist with a ranged weapon in front of the door. The combination of weapon and door material may make the technique harder or easier to do depending on the weapon's firing cycle and door opening speed. Bolt-action + wood door work well enough.
3. Order the pawn to enter the door and immediately as it starts opening, order them to shoot at the ship part. If done correctly, the pawn will shoot through the door as it waits to close again without going through it.
4. The mechs will awaken and will be targets for allies or other enemies. Otherwise, repeat the steps until the ship part is destroyed to turn the threat into a regular raid. The long wall will provide time for your colonist to run back to base.

From left to right: 1. Aiming right after opening the door 2. Shooting as the door closes 3. Mechs awakened with no LoS to the shooter, idling on the right

Version history

• 1.1.0 - Mechanoids now immediately spawn in a dormant state around the ship, as opposed to previously when they would spawn only as a result of the ship taking fire. Other than triggering a "Flee" response in your (non-drafted) colonists if they get too close, everything else, including previous strategies for combating them, appears to remain the same since the Mechanoids stay in that dormant state until provoked. It is likely in this update that the no build area was changed - previously the mechs would attack if building or placing an item within bulged rectangle around the ship part, with a base size of {14 wide × 9 high} plus an extra 1×6-tile row along the top/bottom of the ship part and an extra 1×3 column along each side.
• After 1.6 (undocumented) 1.6.4566 - Awoken mechs now sometimes stand on the right side of the ship instead of always standing on the left. As of live 1.6.4566 mechanoids will almost always stand on the right.