Are drifters spawning every night an outdated mechanic?

[1Joachim1]

1 hour ago, Headshotkill said:

You can easily make use of corrupted biomes with a large rift in the center which potentially spreads outwards over time to get the same effect, this way you have true stable calm areas and temporal instable areas. This way everyone gets to choose where they want to settle and what they want to experience. Like the sound of drifters moaning every night? Set up camp in a corrupted biome, or perhaps you're forced by circumstances to set up camp in a corrupted biome. This can be combined with better loot spawns/ruins to make the increased danger worth the price. If a biome is extremely corrupted you can spawn drifters and other supernatural stuff at day time as well.

welp. IMO a "corrupted biome" could be interesting indeed, but, as you say, only if it has potential for a really, really good loot but.. whathever you do UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCE DO.NOT. ALLOW IT TO SPREAD. "spreading" is a terrible mechanic that almost never works. cleaning chunks in thaumcraft (the other java-based block game) was SO BAD that i used to lose multiplayer servers.. and cleaning tainted terrains in terraria is intensive (and destructive). 

looking at a perspective tho, we have that mechanic already. the deeper you go in the mines the more corruption gets to you and you get "insane" (to name it in some way) faster.
 

2 hours ago, Headshotkill said:

So I've read a lot of replies which refer to the lore of the game and use that as a way to decide drifters spawning at night is inevitable, but to my knowledge a lot of the lore is flexible and should never overrule good gameplay.

 

the lore is there to explain why things are like they are. there's no point on saying in the lore that the world was blessed with peace forever and then make it a living hell ingame for the "enjoyability" factor. yes, it can be flexible, but i still fail to see the "overrule good gameplay" you're talking about. i still don't get what you mean with that. 

if you live in a plains area (no forest nearby) then wolves and bears are non existent... everywhere else during the day you have to deal with them, which can be a lot to deal with... sadly they are "neutral-hostile" which means they are living their lives and minding their business unless you're too close to them... but at -some- nights there's something else actively looking for you with the only objective to kill you no matter where you live. so removing the drifters at night makes the game pointless.

the thing is... peaceful nights are boring everywhere. they are dark as heck but that's it. you're better off illuminating a place and setting some stone fences (to use a bit of those 9 Qintilion stones you get while mining) if you want to work at night. which btw if you do, then drifters are not a problem anymore... also as soon as you've seen the terrain once you have a rough idea of what's going on in that area even at pitch dark in calm nights. you even have the map/minimap as a reminder.. HOWEVER, ≥ medium nights in the wild are insane. you don't know where did that rock came from which took a bit of your health bar.. and suddenly you're surrounded by predators crawling out of everywhere.
 

As i said previously, if you don't want rifts to spawn next to your house then build the device to stop them from appearing. that will -at least- stop your "calm nights" from becoming noisy. but again, dunno what you did to your game, but most of my nights are kinda peaceful. even at early game most nights you can easily get out and kill the 2-3 drifters that are noisy in your door and that's it.

2 hours ago, Headshotkill said:

This and you still get temporal storms anywhere on the map so at regular times you'd experience the crazy supernatural stuff anyway

turn your render distance to the max in a sunny day... to have fun.
 

[Maelstrom]

22 hours ago, l33tmaan said:

Heh, maybe if you go around wiping out all life from around you by constantly destroying respawning dens, your area reacts to the loss of life by making the area more temporally unstable. Is this a good idea? Probably not, but there should definitely be some consequences for devouring all of the resources in an area without sustaining the ecosystem.

What do you mean 'like Baritone'?

it's a pathfinding bot for minecraft that can automate a number of different things, namely pathfinding.  I understand it's used extensively in massive build projects on the 2b2t server.

[Thorfinn]

5 hours ago, 1Joachim1 said:

HOWEVER, ≥ medium nights in the wild are insane.

I don't mind even high rift activity nights, depending on what needs done. Sticking, for example, is fine because you don't need to stay in any one spot for very long. If you shut off music, and stay away from rifts, and relocate every time you hear a stone being thrown, or a drifter moan, you can collect several stacks of sticks in one night with very low risk. But even medium is too much to collect clay or peat.

Apocalyptic is another matter entirely. That's a good time to hole up and knap a gazillion axe heads to split all the firewood to make the charcoal that you will need for steel.

There is a really easy way to deal with the spawning issue if it bothers you, though. Rifts form on the surface...

[Echoweaver]

5 hours ago, 1Joachim1 said:

if you live in a plains area (no forest nearby) then wolves and bears are non existent...

This is true for wolves, but I don't think bears? I've seen bears in grasslands plenty of times.

7 hours ago, Headshotkill said:

So I've read a lot of replies which refer to the lore of the game and use that as a way to decide drifters spawning at night is inevitable, but to my knowledge a lot of the lore is flexible and should never overrule good gameplay.

I agree with this. I think that your sense of good gameplay just isn't universal. I find that the current state of nighttime danger on nights of medium+ temporal stability makes me feel extra attached to the comfort and safety of my base. Having predictable times and locations where we can feel safe to go out exploring combined with times/location when we need to build a quick shelter or run for home seems like a good balance.

I can think of some other mechanics that could provide this. One might be just using the temporal stability meter. I do think that rifts should spawn drifters during the day at least some of the time or do something else bad. But there's a good horror reason to make life more dangerous during the night (i.e. darkness), and what VS does seems fine to me.

Edited June 7, 2023 by Echoweaver

[Thorfinn]

9 minutes ago, Echoweaver said:

This is true for wolves, but I don't think bears? I've seen bears in grasslands plenty of times.

I believe you are right. Not sure, because its possible they spawned on close to a tree or something, but I've seen them far from Forest Floor.

[Headshotkill]

48 minutes ago, Thorfinn said:

I don't mind even high rift activity nights, depending on what needs done. Sticking, for example, is fine because you don't need to stay in any one spot for very long. If you shut off music, and stay away from rifts, and relocate every time you hear a stone being thrown, or a drifter moan, you can collect several stacks of sticks in one night with very low risk. But even medium is too much to collect clay or peat.

Apocalyptic is another matter entirely. That's a good time to hole up and knap a gazillion axe heads to split all the firewood to make the charcoal that you will need for steel.

There is a really easy way to deal with the spawning issue if it bothers you, though. Rifts form on the surface...

This demonstrates one of the points I'm trying to make, low intesity nights aren't dangerous and thus serve no real purpose, just a lot of moaning. So why not save the supernatural stuff for high and apocalyptic nights, keep a clear boundary and keep calm nights truly calm.

43 minutes ago, Echoweaver said:

This is true for wolves, but I don't think bears? I've seen bears in grasslands plenty of times.

I agree with this. I think that your sense of good gameplay just isn't universal. I find that the current state of nighttime danger on nights of medium+ temporal stability makes me feel extra attached to the comfort and safety of my base. Having predictable times and locations where we can feel predictably safe to go out exploring combined with times/location when we need to build a quick shelter or run for home seems like a good balance.

I can think of some other mechanics that could provide this. One might be just using the temporal stability meter. I do think that rifts should spawn drifters during the day at least some of the time or do something else bad. But there's a good horror reason to make life more dangerous during the night (i.e. darkness), and what VS does seems fine to me.

I realise my opinion isn't shared by everyone so I'm willing to make compromises, it also feels like I've struck some crazy RNG where I've never experienced a night without drifters in this game yet, while others say they don't hear it every night.

I'm fine with keeping some nights where drifters lurk around but I'd like 1/3 to 1/2 of all nights to be drifter free, it's the constant moaning drone that really takes away my concentration when doing chores inside.

Edited June 7, 2023 by Headshotkill

[Thorfinn]

1 minute ago, Headshotkill said:

...keep a clear boundary and keep calm nights truly calm.

I guess I never really paid attention. Do drifters spawn on Calm nights? I thought they started on Low. Then again, I've never really figured out the timing of the rift activity changes. Just that, "Huh. I could have sworn when I checked earlier this evening it said 'Low'. It's 'Medium' now."

Now granted, if you accidentally built on top of caverns, you will hear the buggers all the time. I don't know there's anything you can do about that but move. Or maybe that gizmo that was mentioned above. Don't know. Never built it.

[Echoweaver]

39 minutes ago, Headshotkill said:

I realise my opinion isn't shared by everyone so I'm willing to make compromises, it also feels like I've struck some crazy RNG where I've never experienced a night without drifters in this game yet, while others say they don't hear it every night.

Yeah, it really does sound like you're having more consistent nighttime drifters than what I think of as normal. I can't recall ever seeing a drifter on a calm night, and I'm not sure I've ever seen one on a Low night UNLESS there was a rift in the yard (I only hang out that close to rifts if they're right at my base).

I don't suppose it's possible your base is on temporally unstable territory? Or maybe, like Thorfinn said, you're on top of a cave? Though I assume then you'd hear moaning at all times, not just at night.

[Maelstrom]

I've had bears spawn far from trees.  Pretty much anywhere seems legit bear spawn location (except water).

 

Drifters do NOT spawn during calm rift activity.  Low temporal stability (below 15 or 20 percent I believe) can spawn drifters according to temporal storm spawning rules, which could lead to constant drifter spawning REGARDLESS OF RIFT ACTIVITY.

[Thorfinn]

Oh, hey, another possibility. More of a work-around, I guess. Apache's Accessibility Tweaks lets you adjust the volume of individual sound effects. I'm guessing you can turn the drifter sound effects down (maybe off?) when you are in your house, and turn the sounds back on when you head out and need to hear them.

And, yeah, if your base is in an unstable location, bad juju.

On Low rift nights, you can pretty easily get clay and peat, as long as you didn't lose the lottery and get a rift right on top of the deposit. I even did pretty well on a medium rift night, though I ran between 4 different reasonably close deposits. BTW, best way I know of to mark your deposits (or even your path) is using a single fence post and put a firepit on top. (The post is just to get it up out of the grass. That and it's cheaper than dirt, literally. A stick and a log gets you 6 posts. Add a single piece of dry grass, and Bob's your uncle.) It has a low glow (3, I think) even when it's not burning so it's really obvious in the full dark. If you leave some firewood nearby, you can light up the area quite well, and you might as well take the opportunity to fire some torches. You are going to need them anyway.

[Hafthohlladung]

I would be in favour of introducing a new class of drifter that can break wood/soil defences, which would force the player to not just "sit out" all night attacks.

However they would need to appear in limited numbers and be made easily identifiable, so that the player could target this "Demolition Class" drifter and nutralise the threat without neccessarily taking on the entire mob.

Edited June 11, 2023 by Hafthohlladung

[Nymue]

@Hafthohlladung I think the lore story "The Morning" already addressed this. Wood and soil walls keep out Drifters on purpose.

[Kunndt]

8 hours ago, Hafthohlladung said:

I would be in favour of introducing a new class of drifter that can break wood/soil defences, which would force the player to not just "sit out" all night attacks.

However they would need to appear in limited numbers and be made easily identifiable, so that the player could target this "Demolition Class" drifter and nutralise the threat without neccessarily taking on the entire mob.

 

2 hours ago, Nymue said:

@Hafthohlladung I think the lore story "The Morning" already addressed this. Wood and soil walls keep out Drifters on purpose.

I do think something like this would be a good idea, reserved for temporal storms specifically. I've thought drifter's being able to phase through walls, or maybe a special kind of drifter that can, or somehow lets surrounding drifter's also get in, (inspired by the phasing visual drifters seem to have in storms) would make storms less cheese-able. It could make some sense with the world slowly being more and more corrupted as time goes on.

[Maelstrom]

On 6/11/2023 at 9:54 PM, Kunndt said:

I do think something like this would be a good idea, reserved for temporal storms specifically. I've thought drifter's being able to phase through walls, or maybe a special kind of drifter that can, or somehow lets surrounding drifter's also get in, (inspired by the phasing visual drifters seem to have in storms) would make storms less cheese-able. It could make some sense with the world slowly being more and more corrupted as time goes on.

Other bits of lore indicates the world is recovering and not becoming more corrupted.

[Troy]

My only problem with drifters spawning at night is that there's no incentive to engage with them. Dealing with surface drifters is pretty trivial by the copper age. It becomes more of a nuisance than anything, because the rewards they drop aren't worth the time it takes to kill them. In Minecraft, the enemies that spawn at night drop worthwhile amounts of useful resources that can't be grown or mined, like gunpowder and string, so it's worth fighting them. In VS, even a low rift activity night will end with 20 drifters growling outside my door, and I'll get 5-10 flax fibers from killing them, maybe one rusty gear if I'm lucky. Flax is easy to come by even in the cold worlds I like to play in, and it's easier to get rusty and temporal gears from traders. Drifters don't drop anything that can't be obtained more easily through other means, so there's no reason to go outside at night and kill them except to shut them up.

I know I can just sleep through the night or mute the game, but that's just me disengaging from the game. I'd much rather see a small improvement to drifter drops, which would increase my engagement.

[Owktree]

Another option is to turn the temporal rifts off while leaving the storms on when you set a world up.  From my experience surface drifters still turn up from nearby caves now and then, but not in large numbers and not every night.  And the drifters are there in number if you start exploring caves and during the temporal storms.

[Varenvel]

On 6/20/2023 at 11:38 PM, Troy said:

My only problem with drifters spawning at night is that there's no incentive to engage with them. Dealing with surface drifters is pretty trivial by the copper age. It becomes more of a nuisance than anything, because the rewards they drop aren't worth the time it takes to kill them. In Minecraft, the enemies that spawn at night drop worthwhile amounts of useful resources that can't be grown or mined, like gunpowder and string, so it's worth fighting them. In VS, even a low rift activity night will end with 20 drifters growling outside my door, and I'll get 5-10 flax fibers from killing them, maybe one rusty gear if I'm lucky. Flax is easy to come by even in the cold worlds I like to play in, and it's easier to get rusty and temporal gears from traders. Drifters don't drop anything that can't be obtained more easily through other means, so there's no reason to go outside at night and kill them except to shut them up.

I know I can just sleep through the night or mute the game, but that's just me disengaging from the game. I'd much rather see a small improvement to drifter drops, which would increase my engagement.

 

i dont hate surface drifters as some nights are safe some aint who is a bit nice change to minecraft as all nights are not safe(till you oput torches and some minecraft mods had portal mechanic too like underdark , who mobs can kidnap/grab you and drag you in , was funny to hear that on my MC ethernal server when friend is creaming while he is being kidnaped)

but personaly i hate there is no incetive to fight almost any drifters till you reach tier 3 ones, as all drops t1-2 has are just painfuly low

i know this game goes a bit more survival and most survival games "usually better to avoid fighting" but killing 5 drifters and getting no items is just painful

even more so you need to skin them who takes even more time

 

one change id do is they drop items on ground when they die and make them drop reeds , and boost flax drop a bit and maybe get "gear bits" (who would be smaller dominal of gears)

 

not saying boost them enough to incentivise farming , but every fight would not feel like weaste of time , when portal storm comes in i just lock myself in and wait it out as there is no point to it. (its nice horror thing but as game mechanic its just bad)

[Jackal Black]

My personal opinion, you compare VS too much to Minecraft... but really a bit too much. Of course it is built with blocks, of course the game was born from the mod project for MC VintageCraft and is crafted, but it's not that Minecraft is also the only survival game currently in circulation.
Besides, I may be a bad person, but after years of MC and many other survival, I can not associate the word "Survival" to Minecraft.
Minecraft mobs are good for farming, you can make skeletons for arrows and bones, and there is a respective farm, zombies... well, those are only used to make iron farms, creepers are farmed for the gunpowder, the Enderman other farm....
In practice, with their usefulness they are seen more as good for making farms and less and less as a threat. With the exception of the creeper, the stealth one comes at you from behind and if you don't have an armor on you go boom with him (armor that is made on MC as if nothing were anything else).

No really, I don't want to see drifters reduced like that, rather I prefer to find them piled up outside my front door.
Their purpose as I said earlier is to remind the player that there are threats to their life in the game, not give you random items just to make them good for farms.
Do you have 10 drifters away from home at night? Well! Row to bed and spend the night instead, or go out and fight them and then if you don't have a good armor and shield those 10 will lynch you properly as it should be.
I really prefer to raise the level of challenge by implementing other types of drifters that are even more dangerous. If the day is the moment in which the player can do whatever he wants, the night must not be like this, the night must be dangerous and focused on these beasts, if you want to go out you do it at your own risk, or put the option to don't lose your inventory on death and go chill.
Or if they annoy you so much light up the area around the house or turn off the drifters

I would sincerely add new ones, some who know how to open doors and hatches, or maybe one who can hit you ignoring shield and armor (maybe it doesn't hurt too much and there aren't more than a certain amount in a given area). Just to throw down two ideas, but I remain of the opinion that you also have to be able to choose whether to face them or not and that they are always a threat...
But I'm pretty sure someone will always complain about drifters, so in my opinion disable them first in worldgen

Not something useless like MC's mobs.
My personal opinion.

[Maelstrom]

On 6/26/2023 at 8:39 AM, Jackal Black said:

Their purpose as I said earlier is to remind the player that there are threats to their life in the game, not give you random items just to make them good for farms.

^^^
THIS!

Edited June 27, 2023 by Maelstrom

[Thorfinn]

On 6/26/2023 at 9:39 AM, Jackal Black said:

Their purpose as I said earlier is to remind the player that there are threats to their life in the game, not give you random items just to make them good for farms.

They don't even do that, though. That's the problem with them. You can get hit with a few rocks, sure, but with a little practice, spears take down hordes at very little risk, even on Wilderness and no armor. They are the things you don't bother wasting time on in storms looking for the double-headed. Even the nightmares aren't worth losing durability on the several of your spears it's going to take.

Drifters are just a minigame, and unlike the knapping, clayforming, or panning minigames, they are a pointless minigame. The first two guarantee that you have something to show for playing, the second one a decent chance, but what do you have to show for a nighttime of playing the drifter minigame? Maybe a couple fiber, maybe a temporal gear every couple months. You get far more fiber just exploring with a torch, plus you have seeds and food to show for the time, rather than, more often than not, just down a few spears.

[Jackal Black]

2 ore fa, Thorfinn ha detto:

Non lo fanno nemmeno, però. Questo è il problema con loro. Puoi essere colpito con qualche roccia, certo, ma con un po' di pratica, le lance abbattono orde con un rischio minimo, anche su Wilderness e senza armatura. Sono le cose su cui non ti preoccupi di perdere tempo nelle tempeste alla ricerca del doppio. Anche gli incubi non valgono la pena di perdere la durabilità delle molte lance che ci vorranno.

I Drifters sono solo un minigioco e, a differenza dei minigiochi Knapping, Clayforming o Panning, sono un minigioco inutile. I primi due fornire che hai qualcosa da mostrare giocando, il secondo una buona possibilità, ma cosa devi mostrare per una notte di gioco al minigioco vagabondo? Forse un paio di fibre, forse un ingranaggio temporale ogni due mesi. Ottieni molta più fibra semplicemente esplorando con una torcia, inoltre hai semi e cibo da mostrare per il tempo, piuttosto che, il più delle volte, solo alcune lance.

Guarda, se lo lanci su questo pavimento te lo dico subito, e in altri giochi?
Sapete quanti videogiochi ci sono "mostri" che potete tranquillamente decidere se affrontare o meno? In molti videogiochi questi mostri sono totalmente "inutili" dove o perdi solo tempo o comunque non danno premi nell'ucciderli.
Quindi sta al giocatore come su VS decidere se affrontarli o scappare.
E badate bene, non necessariamente piazzando un drop questi iniziano ad avere un valore, anzi, diventano solo un pretesto per la maggior parte del tempo per costringere il giocatore a farmare per allungare il ceppo o raggiungere l'ennesima scorciatoia per accorciare l'ottenimento tempo di qualcosa. Se diamo roba inutile ai vagabondi, i vagabondi diventano inutili, se diamo loro un drop raro o non ottenibile nel gioco, allora rimangono inutili buoni solo per quel drop, se diamo loro un drop comune ma che in in ogni caso ci vorrebbe per ottenerlo in tempo di gioco (un esempio di sasso già levigato giusto per sparare qualcosa a caso) allora le persone invece di andare a minare iniziano a prendere i vagabondi e si torna ai casi precedenti.

Per questo sono dell'idea che vadano riviste un attimo e magari migliorate in termini di pericolosità, restituendo un senso alla loro esistenza.
Però alla fine ci ritorni, visto che dal numero di post non sei un giocatore alle prime armi e sicuramente hai le spalle larghe ormai e quindi avrai sempre abbastanza dimestichezza per gestirle.
Poiché non si tiene nemmeno conto di questo, un giocatore esperto avrà sempre la gestione e il controllo di ogni situazione, un chiaro esempio sono le sfide su Dark Soul, Elden Ring, Bloodborn ecc. subendo danni, mentre se provo a giocarci non ho nemmeno creato il personaggio che sono morto 5 volte.
Sul vintage avrai abbastanza esperienza per giocare duro, ma io non ci provo nemmeno, visto che dalla 1.18 sono morto almeno 20 volte anche per mano di sbandati.

Look, if you throw it on this floor then I'll tell you right away, and in other games?
Do you know how many video games there are "monsters" that you can safely decide whether to face or not? In many video games these monsters are totally "useless" where either you just waste time or in any case they don't give prizes in killing them.
So it's up to the player as on VS to decide whether to face them or run away.
And mind you, not necessarily by placing a drop these start to have a value, on the contrary, they become only an excuse for most of the time to force the player to farm to lengthen the stock or reach yet another shortcut to shorten the obtaining time of something. If we give drifters useless stuff, drifters become useless, if we give them a rare drop or one that can't be obtained in the game, then they remain useless good only for that drop, if we give them a common drop but which in any case would take to get it in game time (an example of stone already polished just to shoot something at random) then people instead of going to undermine begin to get drifters and we go back to the previous cases.

This is why I am of the opinion that they should be reviewed for a moment and perhaps improved in terms of danger, restoring meaning to their existence.
However, in the end you return there, since from the number of posts you are not a first-time player and you certainly have broad shoulders by now and therefore you will always be familiar enough to manage them.
Because you don't even take this into account, an experienced player will always have the management and control of every situation, a clear example are the challenges on Dark Soul, Elden Ring, Bloodborn etc. where you have to get a complete run without taking damage, while if I try to play it I don't even have created the character that I died 5 times.
On vintage you'll be experienced enough to play it Hard, but I don't even try, since from 1.18 I've died at least 20 times even at the hands of drifters.

But these are just my opinions

 

Edited June 27, 2023 by Jackal Black

[Maelstrom]

17 hours ago, Thorfinn said:

They don't even do that, though. That's the problem with them. You can get hit with a few rocks, sure, but with a little practice, spears take down hordes at very little risk, even on Wilderness and no armor. They are the things you don't bother wasting time on in storms looking for the double-headed. Even the nightmares aren't worth losing durability on the several of your spears it's going to take.

Drifters are just a minigame, and unlike the knapping, clayforming, or panning minigames, they are a pointless minigame. The first two guarantee that you have something to show for playing, the second one a decent chance, but what do you have to show for a nighttime of playing the drifter minigame? Maybe a couple fiber, maybe a temporal gear every couple months. You get far more fiber just exploring with a torch, plus you have seeds and food to show for the time, rather than, more often than not, just down a few spears.

I agree with Jackal that the drifters purpose SHOULD be to be a threat at night and in the deep.  It would be nice if there were variety in drifters beyond the obvious we currently have.  Make some surface drifters able to open doors but most can't.  Perhaps some can withstand brighter light levels, but again; most can't.  And give no indication of which kind of drifter you're dealing with.  Smithing something and all of a sudden you're getting your back aggressively scratched by a drifter?  Apparently I didn't "lock" my door properly (which is what door opening drifters would lead to).  That's something I'd LIKE to see.

In the end, I don't think there's a single solution that will satisfy everyone as there's such a wide variety of desires for what players want drifters to be.

[Thorfinn]

Weird. While I was watching, it entered "7" then posted.

I agree that is  what drifters aspire to be. They are the things that go bump in the night. My first couple dozen games were either death to wolves, to drifters, or to hunger, shivering in a tiny dugout waiting for daylight so I could get out and try to find something to eat. I *knew* that they would figure out some way to get in. So, yes, they fulfilled that role, and evidently still do. But once they no longer inspire fear, what then? How about when you learn more lore and no longer fear them, but pity them?

Give them the ability to open doors, and you quit building with doors. Give them the ability to smash through dirt, you switch to stone or stop leaving places for them to stand outside your house. Maybe build a treehouse, and pull your rope ladder up behind you. Maybe make your entrance some parkour challenge. Teach drifters to fly... At some point, you are left with just stopping building at all, which seems to defeat the purpose of having a voxel-based survival game. (Though, to be fair, that's mostly what I do anyway, until winter approaches.) And worse, all these drifter enhancements have made them way too tough for people new to the game, for whom the moaning itself is quite enough of a threat.

I'm not saying to increase loot. I already don't bother with anything but double-headed, and usually not them. Since I see little benefit to translocating to some random place, I see no benefit to farming for temporal gears. So the point to killing drifters has to be something else to make it worthwhile.

How about it adds a point or two to the local temporal stability of the X-Y coordinate it died? Maybe some radius effect? Kill enough drifters around your base and eventually, the Rust World is not close enough to this world so no rifts spawn close by? 

Edited June 28, 2023 by Thorfinn

[Maelstrom]

Killing drifters does increase your personal stability.  Down mining iron a few blocks above lava and a bell starts its claxon?  Kill some drifters and you're good to go for a bit longer.  I've come out of temporal storms with almost full stability.

At the end of the day drifters will be in one of two categories: an annoyance to the experienced player OR a source of resources to be farmed like another unnamed block game.