Just had like 10 children graduate to advlthood, so the first thing I thought I'd do was kick them from the nest, and I guess that's what triggered the deathclaw raid? Anywho, I heard horror stories that these can wipe out entire vaults, but I don't even have people over 35 defending against them. The vaults that get wasted by these things, are they just people who rushed development and overpopulated before having well-leveled/well-geared people?

I'm thinking maybe....


That being said, I spent several days getting "over-prepared" due to the horror stories....


In everyone's defence who was wiped out, it is pretty easy to get to 60 vault dwellers. If you are just growing at a rate of 2 birth cycles a day of 6-8 dwellers.....you will go over 60 in 2-3 days....


It is very easy to grow over 60 and get attacked while having few guns and levels to deal with it.


They really should up the number that triggers the initial attacks to the 100-150 dweller range...

I'm staying at 25 dwellers until I can get everyone's strength and agility maxed and slowly work up, I'm terrified of a death claw attack

Well, so long as you keep dwellers out of the barracks, they won't be reproducing. I would think the number wouldn't matter before the deathclaws, because people would still rush their populations. If people struggle with them at 60, imagine how much worse a rushed population of 150 would be. I think the key is to just focus on strengthening what you have now, and then expand later.

My first few Deathclaw raids were pretty annoying, but I've found more success lately by reacting to them differently than I do Raider attacks or infestations. Normally I keep two guards stationed at the door with my best weapons and armor and move them around to respond to attacks or anything that moves on to another room. With Deathclaws I realized that it almost feels like they were designed to circumvent that tactic - to run through the rooms quickly to cause as much devestation as possible. They're almost more like a natural disaster (almost reminds of the tornados and such in Sim City actually) than a regular attack.

Now I focus more on damage control and picking up the pieces afterwards than trying to retaliate against them. I don't move people around to different rooms to respond to their attacks (because that's almost an exercise in futility,) and instead try to keep people from dying by administering Stimpaks when needed. If I don't try to hurry too much I can usually keep most of my dwellers alive - even if my unarmed dwellers are only doing 1 point of damage, they will eventually kill all the Deathclaws. And then it's just a matter of going back and reviving anyone who has died that I want to keep around.

Some times that has lead to me sitting around with corpses in my production rooms draining my happiness but this is the sort of game that rewards patience - honestly, I'll just them sit there rotting until I've saved up enough money for them (which of course can be awhile if they were high level.) It's also come in handy for population control and getting rid of unnecessary dwellers at times.

And with all that said, I suggest that Deathclaw attacks are limited to just one or two a day, because even though you may successfully defend against them, they can be a tremendous drain on your resources greatly impact the fun you're having with the game. I JUST got attacked a second time THIS MORNING and now I'm afraid to check my game again at all for the rest of the day.