Ranch raid

*"An armed bandit group is heading for your ranch. If you pay them silver, their thirst for profit will be satisfied*

*It will cost*
*300"*

Your ranch will be raided if too many outlaws are killed. When a raid begins, you will have some time to prepare for the attack or pay for mercy.

## Outlaws anger

*"By killing members of the gang you increase the Outlaws Anger. As soon as Anger Reaches the maximum your ranch will be attacked."*

When you go to other locations to gather resources, you can often meet other humans. Some of them are Indians, some of them are cowboys as you are, and the others are outlaws. You can never make peace with the outlaws and whenever you kill them the outlaws' anger increases.

## Maxed outlaws anger

*"You have incurred the Outlaws Anger. An armed group has advanced to your ranch."*

*"You have really pissed off the bandits, Cowboy. Get ready for the attack!"*

Once you have killed enough outlaws, the outlaws anger will max out and a ranch raid will commence. The outlaws will take over 6 hours to march to your ranch. You can still do whatever you like during this period. However, once they reach your ranch, it will enter the attack phase and you have 2 hours\* to fight them off.

\*Note: If you stay at your ranch in the world map the 2-hour timer will stop.
* Case 1: When the 2-hour timer starts and you are somewhere else, the timer will count down until you come back. If you don't come back before the timer runs out, your ranch will be raided with damage to your property, much higher than fighting them in battle.
* Case 2: If you are at your ranch when the 2-hour timer starts, the timer will freeze at 1h59m no matter if you have logged in or not. The actual battle will not start until you enter your ranch. Therefore you can log off after beginning a walk home and next time you log in you will be able to engage the bandits.
* Case 3: If you are at your ranch when the 2-hour timer starts, the raid will begin automatically.

## Ranch raid

If you stayed in or entered your ranch during the 2-hour countdown, the ranch raid begins. A small group of bandits will start attacking and try to get to your chests. If they manage to reach your chests they will take something and try to run away.

One of the outlaws carries a map to their stash. If you manage to take them down, you can read the map to locate the bandit's stash. At their location, you will find some good loot and sometimes some of your lost items from previous raids. the bandit's stash is also a good place to find horse and wagon parts. You can keep the stash map unread to use at a later time, it doesn't expire.

During the battle you can access your storage to equip yourself. The raid will end if either one of the following conditions are met:

* All bandits are killed.
* All or remaining bandits run away.
	+ If a bandit takes something from your chests he will start to run.
	+ All bandits will retreat if the gauge on the lower part of the screen is fully filled which increases as bandits destroy each item.
	+ The bandits will also retreat if the time of raid becomes too long, even if the gauge is not filled up.
* You died.
	+ If you died in the raid you will sustain heavy losses so try your best to stay alive.

## Ranch defense

When fighting the bandits, you have to build up your ranch defense to increase the chance of victory or to stay alive.

Currently(v0.17.1), the traps and obstacles are nearly useless against the bandits so you are advised to surround the base with walls and windows. Windows allow guns and bows to shoot through walls. When the walls are upgraded to shale walls or above they require dynamite to be damaged. Bandits carry limited amount of dynamite and therefore layers of shale walls or better will provide good protection to your property.

A cheap technique for thwarting the bandits is 3 layers of straw walls and 1 layer of wooden spikes (wood and grass is all that's needed for this construction). It's been confirmed that at level 68 bandit attacks that occurred while away (max damage) are unable to break through the innermost of 3 straw walls and run away with no loot stolen. It's useful to add additional doors between layers of walls to slow the bandits.

Items like sandbags that don't fully encompass the building will still be attacked by the bandits (on the side they happen to be attacking) and therefore still benefit the base defense by providing more material for the bandits to work through and thus slowing them down and tiring them out.

## Strategies for fighting bandits

Bandits will attack in a group of 4-6 from a random direction. The group will stay reasonably close together.

If you approach the bandits from outside your house make sure to approach them from one side or the other. Never walk into the middle of the bandits (for example, don't go out a door they are directly attacking), this is the most common way of dying in a bandit attack.

When you approach from either side of the group you can engage just one bandit at a time. After the outer most bandit engages with you, back up a little so you don't engage multiple bandits at once. If you have a decent gun to use this technique should make bandit attacks pretty easy, it's possible to avoid taking any hits if done properly.

You can shoot through windows, so you can avoid going outside to engage the bandits. Though this technique may be complicated by benches and storage around the edges of your house.

Time is critical in bandit attacks. To ensure you get the stash map you have to kill all the bandits before they get tired (watch the gauge on screen), or before they get to your storage and escape. A good technique is to walk to each corner of your house looking for the bandits on the map, once you find them exit a door that's a safe distance away from them and engage them from one side (or if you use the window technique start shooting from indoors). It's advisable to use your better weapons in a bandit attack to ensure a speedy victory.