[Critch]

That's the way I go with it too. Takes over for a while but when a game ends it goes back on the shelf for a year. I find the early game, the initial setup, a bit dull so it's difficult to get into a new game when I've killed off one settlement.

And now an update.

An Update
So Honey was hiding in a bedroom in the South West corner of the settlement, the center was wrecked thanks to destructive insectoids wandering about breaking everything and the fire that was caused by the incendiary grenade launcher, but Honey's little refuge was intact. Three bedrooms, a stonemason room and a research desk all standing and since the wind turbine was right outside and the wiring intact the rooms were still powered. The heaters will be required in the rapidly approaching winter. Food was ok for the moment, she still had most of Ironhead's body to eat, the main problem was that Honey was a strong Ideo-ideologist (the Paleal religion) so she was strongly religiously opposed to eating human flesh. Munching on Ironhead's corpse was keeping her alive but causing a major mood debuff. Added to all the death, destruction and general hardship Honey was normally on the verge of some kind of mental breakdown, swinging wildly between tantrums and catharsis. She'd had a destructive tantrum that destroyed the medical supplies indirectly causing Ironhead's death as there was nothing to treat the wound infection that killed him. And now she was eating his corpse.

The Ideology DLC added religion, this is my first playthrough with the DLC so the Paleal religion is about as basic as can be. No cannibalism, no slavery, no child labor, no drugs, monogamous marriages, no self-mutilation, no organ harvesting, and everybody working for the common good. Church of Ideo-ideology (game generated name), everybody who joined the settlement was pestered by the settlement's religious leader until they converted. Membership had dropped dramatically what with all the deaths, deaths that included the religion's leader La, she got sliced and diced by an armored bug. That's how liberal the religion was, it had a lady divorcee pope, she was Ironhead's ex-wife.

The Return of Takashi
In the other thread I pronounced Takashi dead probably eaten by bugs, but it turned out reports of his death were greatly exaggerated. He'd bravely limped out with a shotgun to face off against the remaining insects but I lost track of him and assumed he was dead. Turns out he'd bravely approached the insectoids, bravely dropped his shotgun and ran away, then bravely had a catatonic breakdown and collapsed into a fetal position coma. I guess the insectoids ignored him as no threat once he collapsed, he'd lain there for two days before I noticed. While the insects slept, Honey sneaked out and dragged him back to safety, cured his malnutrition by feeding him chunks of Ironhead's leg and generally cared for his injuries. The leg she fed Takashi must've been the one with the infection that killed Ironhead though, Takashi got severe food poisoning from it and almost died. Coma plus projectile vomit isn't a great combo. It wasn't enough to revive him from his catatonia though, he slept through the whole period. So Paleal was up to two inhabitants, one a pacifist and one in a coma.

Inhabitant Number Three - Gumby
The last time I played the best way to get new inhabitants was to wait for the local savage faction to raid, then search through the injured that had been left behind to see if any of them were worth recruiting. Capture the good ones, nurse them back to health, put them in a cell and have your warden hit them with the "you know, wouldn't you be happier living here with regular meals and your own bed?" hard sell. That doesn't work for Paleal, the local savage tribe have a religion that worships hard drugs, they always show up with an addiction and a withdrawal that'll lead to coma and death. Rather than capture the injured savages now Paleal either leaves the injured to bleed out, gets a pawn with either "blood thirsty" or "psychopath" trait to wander around finishing them off, or occasionally captures one of them to nurse back to health to be the star of a public execution. The Paleal religion might be fairly soft on a lot of things, but I chose "execution of the guilty admired" so the adherents love it when a guilty nonbeliever gets his throat cut at the alter. Puts a smile on everybody's face for days.

Without that recruitment option, Paleal has to take recruits anyway it can.

There was a message that Gumby was fleeing two man-eating rats and needed shelter. There were no further details, maybe he'd be a trained Empire soldier with armor and a big gun? Turned out he was not, he was another "Incapable of violence" type. I guess that explained why he was running from two rats. He was also not very bright, he got lost on the way to the compound and the rats killed him. Oh well, no great loss. Officially he was an inhabitant of Paleal but he never actually made it to town.

God speed Gumby, we hardly knew you.

Hungry Hungry Honey
Takashi was still catatonic so Honey was feeding both of them with the remains of Ironhead. After finishing off both legs, Honey made the unusual decision that the next best bit to eat was his head so that was ripped off and eaten like a big meat coconut. The arms went next and with both of them eating it was not long until Ironhead was almost all gone. Honey headed out and skirted all the way round the town avoiding main corridors to get to the bodies of Kysott and Maisie. They'd both been lying out in the open for a couple of weeks so both were a bit overripe to eat.

If there's one thing that makes inhabitants sad, it's colonists bodies lying unburied so Kysott and Maisie would need to be taken care of, Gumby too since he was lying outside.

Food was the priority though, if the bodies were off the menu the only other option was to get to the fields and harvest rice. There be insects in the fields though so it was a slow process for Honey. She'd harvest a little, she'd see a bug, she'd scream and run away to cower in hiding until she was brave enough to go back to the fields, then the rotation would start all over again. Eventually she had enough rice to feed herself and Takashi, raw rice doesn't sound very appetizing but all the human flesh was gone so they had to eat what they had.

Takashi the Hero
Eventually Takashi came out of his catatonic state, his couple of weeks in a coma being tended had let all his insect bites and slashes heal up too. Almost all, he'd lost an eye and it wasn't going to heal up. He was a bit unsteady on his feet, but he was as good as he was getting.

The most powerful faction on the planet is the Empire of Eternity. They're technologically advanced and a bit dismissive of everybody else but occasionally they'll offer a reward if you do something for them. Early on in the game one of their Lords was attacked near Paleal and he was given shelter, that got us an "orbital bombardment targeter" as a reward. Mark a spot with it and press the button and an Empire satellite will bombard the area from space. Desperate times called for desperate measures. It was risky, I'd never used one before so I was not sure how destructive it would be or how big an area it would hit, it was a good time to find out. It was safely locked away waiting for the day a raid turned up armed with mortars and sat outside the walls lobbing in shells, but it was needed now.

Takashi limped out with the targeter in his pocket, stealthily sneaked into the burnt out center of the camp and spotted the one remaining large insectoid smashing walls with two of the medium sized bugs. He pointed the targeter where they were standing, it was all done line of sight and the wall limited where he could target, and then he pressed the button. The orbital bombardment did everything it was advertised to do, flattened walls, obliterated bugs, started a few fires. When the bombardment ended there was nothing left of the two medium sized bugs and the large armored one was cracked open and dead.

Unfortunately also dead was Takashi, he was caught in the blast and his innards had turned to gloop. He died a hero, his name will live as long as the settlement exists, maybe two weeks.

So we're back to Honey being the only inhabitant and this time Takashi won't be returning, his body is lying in the middle of the compound. That'll be another grave needed.