I've been getting back into Rimworld after a few years. I've played a bit but never gotten very far. I'm a huge fan of colony management games in general (Dwarf Fortress, Oxygen Not Included, etc.) but Rimworld has always been tough to me. I think part of it is that the tech tree just doesn't make sense in my head.

I think I'm more used to medieval style games with clear "Minecraft like" material progression (can't think of a better term lol). Plus a lot of games I play a gun is just already the highest tech you'll get, so it's this weird thing where I view my weapons as really strong then they're really early game things. Further, I probably think of other weapons I see that are powerful as being super late game weapons.

Can someone give me a breakdown of what techs to research over the first year or two of gameplay? I also might not be researching enough in general. I am 3 seasons in and only have one tech unlocked, batteries. Is that a good pace? I know later it will be faster.

Right now I mostly die to things in the second year it seems like. My new game I am playing with Phoebe Chillax on Adventure Story. Seems like Cassandra Classic on Strive to Survive is the "default". But going over the things they actually change it seems like this will mostly give me smaller raids and events slightly less often, as opposed to doing things like giving me more food from crops. I'm mostly dying to external threats at the moment so I'm trying to make that a teeny bit easier as I learn.