Ashlands feels... Lacking.

[Senyin]

I love Valheim.
I loved Mistlands even if the constant fog made it hard to see the beautiful terrain.
I love Ashlands.
But it feels... lacking?

I can't quite put my finger on it, but the Ashlands as a whole feels very empty, despite having so many enemies.

I think it's the lack of things to discover.

Mistlands had dwarven ruins, towers, dwarven digging sites, skeletal structures, bug caves, mineshafts, underground ruins, etc.
The Mountain biome had ice caves, cultist caves, werewolves at night.

Ashlands... doesn't feel like it has any mystery.

Sure there's a morgan cave here and there, but it's just a single room.
There's crumbled ruins and camps, but nothing to discover in them.
There are fortresses which is very cool, but there are no other structures to find and explore.
There are no unique enemies that appear at night, in fact I would say there is no difference between night and day. It's the same onslaught of enemies no matter what time.

I love Valheim, but Ashlands does not spark that sense of wonder and desire to explore. In fact, having only 2 or 3 gems per fortress destroyed is disheartening when you enjoy making every new weapon that comes out & display them in your home. I feel like I won't be able to do that since there are limited fortresses.

There needs to be more to explore, more ways to find gems.

Underground bunkers.
Mage towers that you have to Enter and climb to the top.
Wingless Valkyrie dens where they became horrid crawling beast.
Necromancers dens where they are creating the morgans and unleashing them.
Basements under the Forts, so once you break into the fort you can go into the underground area and clear it out for even more gems.

Things like this, and monsters that are unique to the night cycle, would make Ashlands feel so much better.

[Nerevar]

ashlands fortresses beeing all the same and haveing no real dungeon delving after you broke inside is the lacking part. the devs said this was thier original concept and sadly they ran out of time. i told them they wasted too much devhours on the sailing one time trip. that was wrong fokus given the stone portal was added makeing most of this development wasted work hours as most players will do this part once and then never again.

the stone portal grossly speeded up the biome progression of an already small biome and the lack of proper dungeons on top is why ashlands feels like that.

[Yampire]

Originally posted by Senyin:

There needs to be more to explore, more ways to find gems.

The lack of gems is a major issue in Ashlands, even more so than the noticeable performance issues the update brought with it.
It is disappointing not to be able to craft/upgrade every new weapon the biome has to offer, especially since this was never an issue in any biome before Ashlands.

It feels cheap to turn resource multiplier from default to x3 just to boost gem drop rate from charred chests in the last remaining fortresses I have left to raid.

[Senyin]

Originally posted by Yampire:

Originally posted by Senyin:

There needs to be more to explore, more ways to find gems.

The lack of gems is a major issue in Ashlands, even more so than the noticeable performance issues the update brought with it.
It is disappointing not to be able to craft/upgrade every new weapon the biome has to offer, especially since this was never an issue in any biome before Ashlands.

It feels cheap to turn resource multiplier from default to x3 just to boost gem drop rate from charred chests in the last remaining fortresses I have left to raid.

Me & my husband play and we are both very sad that we won't be able to craft every weapon. We've gotten all but 3 fortresses, used a map-generator to double check, and we don't even have enough at 2x multiplier.

To say we were crushed by this is an understatement. The only way for us to get all the weapons is to cheat... and neither one of us want to cheat.
We've put the game down for now. It was quite the blow.

[Draconis]

Originally posted by Nerevar:

ashlands fortresses beeing all the same and haveing no real dungeon delving after you broke inside is the lacking part. the devs said this was thier original concept and sadly they ran out of time. i told them they wasted too much devhours on the sailing one time trip. that was wrong fokus given the stone portal was added makeing most of this development wasted work hours as most players will do this part once and then never again.

the stone portal grossly speeded up the biome progression of an already small biome and the lack of proper dungeons on top is why ashlands feels like that.

Wrong focus or not, I have to admit that this one trip left qute a memory for me and a friend of mine. A short but worthy part of the adventure.

So there is still hope that those dungeons will be added later? Now that ashlands is released they can take some time on that. We'll need some more gems anyway when it comes to upgrading weapons to 4 later.

[Nerevar]

Originally posted by Draconis:

Originally posted by Nerevar:

ashlands fortresses beeing all the same and haveing no real dungeon delving after you broke inside is the lacking part. the devs said this was thier original concept and sadly they ran out of time. i told them they wasted too much devhours on the sailing one time trip. that was wrong fokus given the stone portal was added makeing most of this development wasted work hours as most players will do this part once and then never again.

the stone portal grossly speeded up the biome progression of an already small biome and the lack of proper dungeons on top is why ashlands feels like that.

Wrong focus or not, I have to admit that this one trip left qute a memory for me and a friend of mine. A short but worthy part of the adventure.

So there is still hope that those dungeons will be added later? Now that ashlands is released they can take some time on that. We'll need some more gems anyway when it comes to upgrading weapons to 4 later.

not for existing worlds. maybe with 1.0 in a few years. but for now : not a chance. most players have now explored most of thier small ashlands biome space and thus wouldnt get any dungeons to spawn anymore. dmg is done for now on that front. would have had to delay the biome for another 10 months to get the dungeons done and THAT would have pushed the too long wait without meaningful content since mistlands too far according to devs.

the gem issue is known. they are cosidereing removeing the gem requirements from the weapons upgrades as the upgrades dont add ANYTHING elemental wise it makes little sense for them to cost more gems. thats just drain for no good reason. dynwyrn useing gems also makes no sense. another consideration currently is to craft them out of the more rare trophy drops like morgen/valk etc or add them as a drop from magmafish fishing like you can get flametal already.

the initial gem cost is fine. youll get enough of these to make all weapons for 2-3 players. the idea was never to let all players make ALL weapons as thats not useful to begin with.

[Sam]

Originally posted by Senyin:

Originally posted by Yampire:

The lack of gems is a major issue in Ashlands, even more so than the noticeable performance issues the update brought with it.
It is disappointing not to be able to craft/upgrade every new weapon the biome has to offer, especially since this was never an issue in any biome before Ashlands.

It feels cheap to turn resource multiplier from default to x3 just to boost gem drop rate from charred chests in the last remaining fortresses I have left to raid.

Me & my husband play and we are both very sad that we won't be able to craft every weapon. We've gotten all but 3 fortresses, used a map-generator to double check, and we don't even have enough at 2x multiplier.

To say we were crushed by this is an understatement. The only way for us to get all the weapons is to cheat... and neither one of us want to cheat.
We've put the game down for now. It was quite the blow.

I mean, there is an alternative, just create a new world, bring materials for the new boat and re-conquer the Ashlands. I wouldn't say thats really cheating, just expanding your world.

[Senyin]

Originally posted by Nerevar:

the initial gem cost is fine. youll get enough of these to make all weapons for 2-3 players. the idea was never to let all players make ALL weapons as thats not useful to begin with.

It's not about being useful.
Me & My husband LOVE decorating the house with every weapon. We have full weapon rooms & an armory!
It's incredibly fun to build and collect every weapon & armor set, then display it in the home. It takes a lot of farming, especially those dang werewolves, but its so nice.

The fact that we won't be able to do this in Ashlands is soul crushing.

I am sure there are other builders out there, who focus more on the crafting part of the game, who feel the same.

[UncleAcidic]

Originally posted by Senyin:

Originally posted by Nerevar:

the initial gem cost is fine. youll get enough of these to make all weapons for 2-3 players. the idea was never to let all players make ALL weapons as thats not useful to begin with.

It's not about being useful.
Me & My husband LOVE decorating the house with every weapon. We have full weapon rooms & an armory!
It's incredibly fun to build and collect every weapon & armor set, then display it in the home. It takes a lot of farming, especially those dang werewolves, but its so nice.

I am sure there are other builders out there, who focus more on the crafting part of the game, who feel the same.

I agree. a big part of the game for many of us is the trophy collector aspect. will I ever use Krom? Nope, but you bet I got one on my wall.
I'm def in the builder category myself. I have never been so initially frustrated and ultimately inspired by a building system in a game previous to Valheim. it will forever be my basis for comparison.

Originally posted by Senyin:

Originally posted by Nerevar:

The fact that we won't be able to do this in Ashlands is soul crushing.

i'll try and salve your wound a bit by saying that the fact that you wont be able to make every ashlands weapon is actually a bit lovely because each play through will be a bit unique in this way. we never get everything we want. this type of austerity is typical of the Valheim experience as I see it.

[Nerevar]

Originally posted by Senyin:

Originally posted by Nerevar:

the initial gem cost is fine. youll get enough of these to make all weapons for 2-3 players. the idea was never to let all players make ALL weapons as thats not useful to begin with.

It's not about being useful.
Me & My husband LOVE decorating the house with every weapon. We have full weapon rooms & an armory!
It's incredibly fun to build and collect every weapon & armor set, then display it in the home. It takes a lot of farming, especially those dang werewolves, but its so nice.

The fact that we won't be able to do this in Ashlands is soul crushing.

I am sure there are other builders out there, who focus more on the crafting part of the game, who feel the same.

that is totally possible. as for the deco you only need the level 1 weapon. no reason to upgrade these at all. thats 1 of each gem per weapon. there is 7 gem weapons and 3 magic tools. 8 if you count dynwyrn but you can only make dynwyrn once per gameworld to begin with so ill exclude that for now.

thats 7 iolite to get all the weapons since no magic tool uses it. (dont ask me why dundr uses bloodstone instead of iolite it makes no sense)

then you need 8 jade for all weapons and magic tools. as only the staff of the wild uses jade.

and then 10(11 if you count dynwyrn) bloodstones. 1 for the forge upgrade. 2 for magic
tools. 7 for weapons.

so 7 iolite. 8 jade. and 10 bloodstones. you have 20 fortresses which can have 2-4 charred chests in them (4 is VERY rare but possible). 2-3 gems on average per. thats an easy safe bet.

now you arent getting ALL weapons for 2-3 players AND another set for decoration. but that aint needed to begin with.

now you dont need that same amount for all players as nobody uses ALL the different gemmed weapons to begin with. thats not realistic to expect nor done by anyone especially when 1 type is CLEARLY stronger than the other in some cases.

but you need 2 gems per weapon you wanna use and 4 per magic tool.

so lets assume 4 weapons from the forge and 2 magic tools per player on average to be fair and spread the options out.

thats like 8 iolite in most of the melee weapons cases and 4 jade and 1 bloodstone per player (the dundr isnt that good and upgradeing the trollstav is currently a waste of materials clearly) magic tools never exceed 4 jade per player as only 1 tool uses them.

we dont know for certain if more upgrades are available before deep north at all sadly. 1 might be likely. 2 are not happening tough.

that amount of gems in 20 fortresses is realistic. now loseing gems due to despawn if people break the chests by combat and dont loot or die is painful. avoid at all costs.

the devs are considering either removeing the gem cost for upgrades as these only add phys dmg anyway and are currently a waste of gems clearly for the most part on melee weapons (bow is an exception due to the spirit gain)
another thing up for consideration currently is useing rare trophies to allow the player to craft gems out of flametal and the trophy.

we will see what they do or dont do.

dynwyrn only existing once per gameworld has the simple reason : its a trophy to hang on your wall so people can showcase a legit dynwyrn finally. its not meant to be more than that currently.

[FunkFloyd]

You only need to play ashland for the next biome. Like all other biomes. No progression. Because you keep dying and all stas get destoyed. You cant pogress difrent type of weapons. Valheim is not fun anymore. And Ashland is the worse biome. Yeah great Devs. Fill the area with mobs. Fantastic design.

[Nerevar]

Originally posted by FunkFloyd:

You only need to play ashland for the next biome. Like all other biomes. No progression. Because you keep dying and all stas get destoyed. You cant pogress difrent type of weapons. Valheim is not fun anymore. And Ashland is the worse biome. Yeah great Devs. Fill the area with mobs. Fantastic design.

if you keep dying that much youre probaly doing something wrong its hard to say what precisely without seeing you play sadly. consider lowering your difficulty.

[ministrog]

Originally posted by Senyin:

I love Valheim.
I loved Mistlands even if the constant fog made it hard to see the beautiful terrain.
I love Ashlands.
But it feels... lacking?

...

Mistlands had dwarven ruins, towers, dwarven digging sites, skeletal structures, bug caves, mineshafts, underground ruins, etc.
The Mountain biome had ice caves, cultist caves, werewolves at night.

Ashlands... doesn't feel like it has any mystery.

...

Underground bunkers.
Mage towers that you have to Enter and climb to the top.
Wingless Valkyrie dens where they became horrid crawling beast.
Necromancers dens where they are creating the morgans and unleashing them.
Basements under the Forts, so once you break into the fort you can go into the underground area and clear it out for even more gems.

Things like this, and monsters that are unique to the night cycle, would make Ashlands feel so much better.

so while i was building my askvin auto farm i had to capture some askvins. so i made a taming pit and while doing so, a lot of their 'friends' decided to make my life hard. turned on some worlds mods, collected my stuff off the lava, and cleaned up the area because there was a ton of grausten. but during the massive fight which killed me several times, i was always paying attention.

every time a morgen rolled over a building or ruin with plants, there's alot of damage numbers under ground. the grausten then appears under the surface of the ground but still collectable. what was really interesting was the shape those damage numbers made. there's structure to them; meaning that the ruins we see that's probably 3x4 m is actually more higher than what's on the surface. kinda like an iceberg.

not digging around to find out, because noise agro, but will be investigating what's with that. maybe it's nothing, who knows.

as for the night cycle, maybe they could flip it on it's head. night is safe and day is blazing hot WW3 like what we got so far. seems like a cheap way of doing it, but could work.

[Senyin]

Originally posted by ministrog:

every time a morgen rolled over a building or ruin with plants, there's alot of damage numbers under ground. the grausten then appears under the surface of the ground but still collectable. what was really interesting was the shape those damage numbers made. there's structure to them; meaning that the ruins we see that's probably 3x4 m is actually more higher than what's on the surface. kinda like an iceberg.

not digging around to find out, because noise agro, but will be investigating what's with that. maybe it's nothing, who knows.

as for the night cycle, maybe they could flip it on it's head. night is safe and day is blazing hot WW3 like what we got so far. seems like a cheap way of doing it, but could work.

I dug a mote around our base to deal with the skeletons. The ruined structures go deep into the ground, and make for digging a mote rather annoying if you do it next to any ruin.
I'm confused as to why they did this, especially since it seems to be smaller pieces of building. I feel like having so many rendered structures under the ground is not helping with the lag problem.