Valheim

[strumpusplunket]

Collect and store everything initially, you'll need it all at some point. For building you can never have enough wood. Stone is needed later on (and lots of it) so try and store that too. Any wooden structure not protected by a roof takes rain damage down to 50%. You can eat 3 different types of food at the same time which all give different health/stamina bonuses. Smoke inside buildings kills

Don't want to tell you too much as part of the fun for us was in discovering stuff as we went

Cheers. All that makes the game sound so good!

Cool to have some early things to concentrate on, too. I may not be able to wait until the kids' birthdays at this rate

 

[Angilion]

I bought it and had a quick go. Just maybe half an hour to give it a try.

~4 hours later I took a break. I've explored a tiny fraction of the huge map and I haven't even started planning for starting the main storyline. Plenty of time for that later. I've got berries and stone and flint to gather and trees to cut down and tools to make and a house to build. I'm going to get a lot of fun out of this game and the price makes it the best value for money game I've played since Atom RPG.

I'm finding the house building pretty poor, though. Snapping seems to be very finicky. Maybe I'm doing something wrong. On my current attempt I repaired a ruined shed I found and stuck a workbench in it so that I could use the workbench to make a hoe to level some land before building and I'm trying to construct a timber frame first. Maybe that will make the snapping less difficult. But night came again so I decided it was time to take a break and have a cup of tea and some food IRL. But I don't have any raspberries in my chest fridge


EDIT: A quick question - if you have a thatch roof, will smoke from a fire indoors get out through the roof? It should because that's how it works in the real world. As long as the roof is high enough, the smoke remains out of the way and seeps through the thatch. That has the added benefit of keeping vermin out of the thatch and dissuading birds from taking the thatch for nest building. It's one of the reasons why roundhouses had such steeply angled thatched roofs (the other being to increase rain resistance and slow down rotting). A simple hole in the roof type chimney is a very bad idea with a thatched roof and sooner or later will cause the roof to catch fire.

 

[Bickaxe]

You need to construct a chimney over the fire, the pieces are there to do this from the start otherwise the room will full with smoke.

 

[Matty8787]

Click it, you fool!

If you like survival games it's a no-brainer. Best one I've played, providing you don't want the PVP style of gameplay in Rust

Bought! My first house doesn't have a chimney I just left gaps on the edge for the smoke to escape

Anyhow, hoping to join in some online fun eventually!

 

[ExRayTed]

Cheers. All that makes the game sound so good!

Cool to have some early things to concentrate on, too. I may not be able to wait until the kids' birthdays at this rate

It's been a long time since I've enjoyed a game this much. It does get a little grindy when collecting some of the mid-game resources but there's so much to do and the map is huge that it never gets boring. I play with my wife and we've had a great time so far, and that's with well over 200 hours each

We haven't rushed, just spending the time exploring, crafting, building etc. If you and your kids like survival games you're going to have a blast

 

[ExRayTed]

EDIT: A quick question - if you have a thatch roof, will smoke from a fire indoors get out through the roof? It should because that's how it works in the real world. As long as the roof is high enough, the smoke remains out of the way and seeps through the thatch. That has the added benefit of keeping vermin out of the thatch and dissuading birds from taking the thatch for nest building. It's one of the reasons why roundhouses had such steeply angled thatched roofs (the other being to increase rain resistance and slow down rotting). A simple hole in the roof type chimney is a very bad idea with a thatched roof and sooner or later will cause the roof to catch fire.

If you build the roof high enough the smoke won't kill you, at least it didn't when I tried but I built a chimney not long after using small wooden posts and angled thatch roof.

The building can be finicky, a trick is to hold down shift when trying to place parts. That way they won't try and snap into place so much.

 

[Angilion]

[..] I'm finding the house building pretty poor, though. Snapping seems to be very finicky. Maybe I'm doing something wrong. [..]

I was doing something wrong. I was trying to position each piece correctly. Instead, you need to point the cursor at the point you want it to snap to. Building became vastly better when I learned that!

Then I was killed by a tree I'd cut down and had to run back to my camp at night, reaching my shed with 1hp. Now waiting for day. Hopefully I'll get my home built during the next day so I can make a bed (the shed isn't big enough for one). I think I might have planned too ambitiously for a first house. I'm needing a lot of wood.

I'm planning on building a chimney on the side of the house, which should work. Although it probably won't heat all of the house. Maybe I'll add more fires and chimneys.

 

[Kutter]

When you manage to get safely back to your base in the meadows, after nearly being killed multiple times slogging it back through the black forest with your ore, the feeling of relief is awesome.
Last game that felt like this was Ultima online.

 

[Kainz]

When you manage to get safely back to your base in the meadows, after nearly being killed multiple times slogging it back through the black forest with your ore, the feeling of relief is awesome.
Last game that felt like this was Ultima online.

Says it all really.

If anyone is on the fence about buying the game I'd recommend just jumping off the fence and buying. You will get a ton of playtime from this.
At first house building does seem absolutely cack but once you get into the swing of things, it is very good and you can easily lose hours just building your home/base. Just remember to fence it and protect it from mob events and raids, which will eventually happen.

I am in the Silver age on my SP game now and spend most of my time in the mountains, and boy is that place unforgiving. I still prefer it to the swamp though because if I encounter a big 'stone' thing, I just leg it. It makes trolls look like wimps in comparison.

 

[Angilion]

I've got my moderately decent first house built now, with shelter, cooking facilities, racks of chests to store the resources I'm gathering and a L2 workbench. Still dressed in rags, so it's time to kill some animals to make some leather clothing that the game has decided to treat as armour because fantasy tropes. And a bow so I can start training in archery for later. While planning a castle. Why build a castle? Because you can. A castle with a moat and a herd of pigs and and maybe a farm. I've found some seeds, so I'm guessing there's a farming system that I will discover in time.

I'll probably get around to the main story at some point, maybe in another 100 hours or so.

What a bargain for £15.

 

[ExRayTed]

The archery is so satisfying in this game. I crafted an absolute ton of wooden arrows for target practice, birds etc and just sit for ages in a wide open space and try and pick off mobs long distance.

Or if I fancy more of a challenge I'll go making noise in the black forest and try to legolas the hell out of the rampaging hordes that arrive

 

[ElliorR]

It's weird what sometimes pops into your mind.

I have been renovating my main home and a bridge I built to cross a nearby river, and a few mins ago I moved my 2 beehives so they were symmetrical. When I had placed them I suddenly thought a beehive looks like Boris Johnson's vagina if he had one.

 

[delta0]

Found Ashlands while sailing around the bottom of the map. Got lots of flame metal then proceeded to “investigate” the edge of the map. Well that was a bad idea...

 

[Angilion]

Found Ashlands while sailing around the bottom of the map. Got lots of flame metal then proceeded to “investigate” the edge of the map. Well that was a bad idea...

Shush! You'll summon the flat earthers!

 

[Angilion]

The archery is so satisfying in this game. I crafted an absolute ton of wooden arrows for target practice, birds etc and just sit for ages in a wide open space and try and pick off mobs long distance.

Or if I fancy more of a challenge I'll go making noise in the black forest and try to legolas the hell out of the rampaging hordes that arrive

I spent a while trying (and failing) to shoot seagulls in flight. My home is on the coast and there are quite a few seagulls around. I also spent a while trying to run backwards while shooting charging boars that I'd missed with my first shot. That didn't work out very well either. I think I'll shoot trees for a while for practice. They don't move or gore me

I made a flint spear and found it disappointing. Polearms should be better than an axe for 1v1 in an open area, but I found them much worse.

Is there a way to break tools and weapons down for components? Or just destroy them? I ended up throwing the spear in the sea to get rid of it. It floated. A bit later, I found it on the shore. It would be quite something if the game has tides and currents, but I'm not sure. It was close to where I threw it in. Maybe the ingame mechanic is much simpler than tides and currents, more akin to a log rolling downhill.

 

[delta0]

Shush! You'll summon the flat earthers!

 

[Kainz]

I spent a while trying (and failing) to shoot seagulls in flight. My home is on the coast and there are quite a few seagulls around. I also spent a while trying to run backwards while shooting charging boars that I'd missed with my first shot. That didn't work out very well either. I think I'll shoot trees for a while for practice. They don't move or gore me

I made a flint spear and found it disappointing. Polearms should be better than an axe for 1v1 in an open area, but I found them much worse.

Is there a way to break tools and weapons down for components? Or just destroy them? I ended up throwing the spear in the sea to get rid of it. It floated. A bit later, I found it on the shore. It would be quite something if the game has tides and currents, but I'm not sure. It was close to where I threw it in. Maybe the ingame mechanic is much simpler than tides and currents, more akin to a log rolling downhill.

Doubt this works in MP since I now play SP.

You can't yet dismantle tools or directly 'trash' them sadly. What I do with junk is I have a small 1x1 pit I throw junk into, I then call up the console and type 'removedrops'. That should remove everything loose on the ground around you so be careful if you're in the middle of smelting ingots! I think the command works within a certain radius around you rather than on the entire map as after using that command yesterday I found some dropped loot (possibly from a boar v neck fight) in the far corner of my base.

 

[Bickaxe]

I spent a while trying (and failing) to shoot seagulls in flight. My home is on the coast and there are quite a few seagulls around. I also spent a while trying to run backwards while shooting charging boars that I'd missed with my first shot. That didn't work out very well either. I think I'll shoot trees for a while for practice. They don't move or gore me

I tend to wait until the birds land and then shoot them, much easier.
A shield helps with boar, just block and hit them after they attack. They will run off but they will come back for another go.
I tend to avoid the spear as an axe does similar damage and it saves me having to carry one.

I seem to spend an inordinate amount of time cutting trees down so they fall on Greylings....

 

[Angilion]

I tend to wait until the birds land and then shoot them, much easier

Which is why I was trying to shoot them in flight - because it's much harder. I shoot seagulls on land if I want feathers. I don't know what feathers are for yet, but I'm sure I'll find a use for them. I thought I might need them for arrows, but I could make arrows with only wood. Maybe better arrows require feathers. Maybe feathers can be used to make a special cloak or better bedding that will improve the comfort level of your bed. I'll find out. That's part of the fun - finding stuff out while playing.

A shield helps with boar, just block and hit them after they attack. They will run off but they will come back for another go.

Can you wield a shield with a bow? You shouldn't be able to. If I want to simply kill boars, I use my flint axe. Which reminds me - I haven't made a shield yet. I should. Shields were extremely useful in real life when the technology level was the same as it is in the game and with a 1 handed weapon, so I hope they are in the game.

I tend to avoid the spear as an axe does similar damage and it saves me having to carry one.

Yes, but it should be much better. Polearms were the go to weapon type for millenia in reality for very good reasons and spears are the simplest highly effective polearm.

I seem to spend an inordinate amount of time cutting trees down so they fall on Greylings....

I've spent more time cutting down trees so they fall on me Only once, but that was enough. I didn't have a bed in my house at the time - I was cutting wood to build the house and of course I couldn't make a roof until I'd made the walls. I'd repaired a dilapidated hut with a roof so I could use a workbench, but it was too small to get a bed in it as well. So I ended up walking and running from the stone circle start point back to my building site. Naked. In the dark. Carrying nothing. I had 1 hp left when I made it to my shed and stood inside it all night, waiting for daylight so I could see if I could make it back to my corpse and get my possessions back without encountering a boar or anything else dangerous. It was raining, which seemed perfectly apt.

I did get a felled trunk rolling downhill at a Greyling, but it didn't seem to do any damage. Maybe it didn't do enough damage to overcome the Greyling's resistance to blunt damage. The trunk wasn't moving quickly.

 

[Jay85]

Spent the last 2 days hunting for Silver after acquiring Wishbone, what a **** take to find it! Not too bad finding snowy mountain Biomes but actually finding the silver Veins is a nightmare! Wish there was a location indicator instead of trying to follow when the flash gets faster. At least once you find them you get a substantial amount to pick at.