What are you doing naked in that cave? Oh....

[XXon 31]

People adapt or hack to find the path of least resistance in any video game, sometimes in ways unforeseen or overlooked by the game company. I forget what online fighting game my son played years ago, but there was a balance patch to make different characters with different abilities more evenly matched, as well as match up players with skill by way of a rankings system. Right away, every match was gunslinger vs gunslinger, the same character. Nobody played the other characters because they all would lose and your rankings would suffer. The thing is, everyone hated this, yet they were forced to do it to play the game they liked and it went on for months until people just quit.

I confess. I chain binge bear berries to dive as long as I want without any gear and I find awesome stuff at very low level. It's not without risk, but it works great. Harmless fun. I'm not sure if this was unforeseen, or if it was intentional design, but that's how I adapted to the rules of the game.

I always stand a log block vertically and build three steps and jump on it every time I see an enemy in a cave. It takes just a few seconds. Then, I plink the enemy to death with arrows. I can kill anything like this, 25 at a time if you wish. I never take a hit. 300 arrows get me to the end of any cave and I can be naked the whole time. Nice image, I know. Plus, lots of times, you can be out of aggro range or something and the thing just stands still while you kill it. Plus+, the bow never wavers once you zero it in. Click it to death. Yeah, you can do it outside too, but caves is where this technique shines. Caves lack bushes and trees you can hop up on. Outside, you can get out of trouble most of the time, but caves mostly aren't like that. There are "natural" barriers like elevation changes, but only once in a while. So, this is my hack. Now, I don't like doing it, because it feels really, really cheap and it is very boring. But, I'm gonna do it. And you will, too. If you weren't already. Shame on everyone. Plus, it renders melee weapons irrelevant, which sux. Also, close combat generally sets the enemy off and he doesn't just stand still and die, so added bonus for the melee that doesn't happen. Eventually, you upgrade this technique to firearms, of course, but always you are able to kill with impunity until you amass enough stuff to armor up so heavily that you can once again kill with impunity with melee and save the bother with the bullets and arrows. Easy win, hollow victory. Yea me!

Can you please stop me from placing blocks in caves? This would change everything for the better with minimal side effects. It doesn't have to be the whole cave even, just below a certain depth would be fine if that makes it simpler. Right now, it's gunslinger vs gunslinger. The balance is off. I am forced to play in a way that is boring and cheap just to play the game I love. Maybe it's just me. Maybe it's how you meant it to be played. Maybe it's a bug. I dunno. I do know it's how people will play the game, no doubt there. It's the path of least resistance.

Once they built an office building and a parking lot with grass in between and waited to build the sidewalks until there were visible paths worn. To keep people from walking on the grass, of course. People will walk the shortest way regardless of the sidewalk placement. And once you see that others before you have worn a path, off you go, walking on the grass...

Just wondering if anyone else has little hacks like the bear berries. Things no one has thought of. In the interest of science. Sorry if I ranted.

P.S. Don't let me place blocks in caves. Please. Thanks. Peace out.

[XXon 31]

I wonder can I carry around a cannon in my pocket, place it, use it, put it back in my pocket.

[Mello1223 591]

and what about people like me who like to build underground bases or underground quarries. underground tunnels from island to island. there are many of us who like to use this space as well.

 

[zarwil 393]

I think the devs are well aware that the game isn't very challenging. Hopefully they get somewhere with enemy ranged attacks.

[spiritchaser28 920]

I was standing on top of one of the tents in a raider camp. That used to be a safe zone. Some Hyenas and a rhino ran up the tent at me yesterday. It goes to show you they are working on AI pathways, so it's a start for no safe place.  It made it slightly more of a challenge....one day the tops of trees won't be safe from some enemies and hopefully like you say @zarwil enemy ranged attacks will come along with those challenges....I think maybe next update may have some water challenges. I know they mentioned it was going to be a big update for ships.....so hopefully sharks are coming back( and hopefully more) along with that update

I'm looking forward to aerial dangers as well.

[XXon 31]

Been having some fun in multiplayer. Sometimes. The players are cool, sometimes the ping is bad I guess. On the explore map, multiplayer is a total crap shoot. Some info before I join would be great, even just the ability to ping the game before joining. Bad ping leads to frozen enemies or worse. Is there some way to blend the clumsy list based multiplayer game board, which has great information and the one which I have the best luck joining, and the non-informative question mark which is the explore multiplayer. Can the editor be fully used on a "home island" and made into a game. This seems way more interesting than "Hey look at my base and my boat but don't touch anything, I'm watching you" which is what the current state of affairs is, as I have visited other people stuff this is the vibe. Not an open door policy at all unless it's a random "let's mining drill this island to death and build stupid stuff" multiplayer island which is also needed and fun. This game has a bit of an identity crisis between the editor and the explore. Blending the two halves a bit would help the deeper and more engaging "editor game half" by using the rather superficial "explore game half" to push traffic to it. Put the "games" on the world map just like any other  explore multiplayer, but give info when you hover any of them that gives ping and a description and number of players.

As for the cave fighting issue, I will add that two players trying to melee as a team are only going to kill each other. Ask me how I know...

I guess everyone has seen the spinning workstations onboard a boat. It seems like its only the ones that involve fire but I could be wrong. Foundry, blacksmithy, kiln all spin I do know that, every time you use it it spins around random to land in a different alignment. Saw it on another players boat as we were sailing, too.

My animal companion was killed in combat and never heard from again. In multiplayer. I guess that's how it works, if so, I like it.

Player numbers are ticking up.

[spiritchaser28 920]

4 hours ago, XXon said:

Is there some way to blend the clumsy list based multiplayer game board, which has great information and the one which I have the best luck joining, and the non-informative question mark which is the explore multiplayer.

I would like to have the option to hide games I don't play or don't like.