Elk Riding Feels Awful

[cjc813]

I understand that we want to balance the increased speed with drawbacks, otherwise the elk would just fly through all environments and be too powerful. I'm not asking for that.

However, there is *zero* reason that turning 180 degrees should take every bit of 4 seconds.

I imagine this is to avoid trivializing rough terrain, but here's the thing: we could probably double the turn speed of an elk (2 second 180 degree turns are still *extremely* slow) and rough terrain would still slow you down plenty. You have to slow down to navigate trees and leaves, swim through or go around bodies of water, and slow down to avoid running off cliffs or into pits. All of these things will still require the player to be engaged and careful (and will punish carelessness) with a faster turn speed.

As someone who loves this game, I still have to say this is honestly ridiculous and makes the elk extremely disappointing.

Add to this the fact that first person view feels jerky and unpleasant, and riding the elk on anything other than an open field feels awful right now.

I'm honestly not 100% sure I wouldn't rather just go on foot, even if it'll take longer. That's a problem. The elk should be a useful upgrade for long-range travel.

EDIT: are there mods/config files that allow you to change the turn speed?

Edited March 16, 2025 by cjc813

[LadyWYT]

11 hours ago, cjc813 said:

I'm honestly not 100% sure I wouldn't rather just go on foot, even if it'll take longer.

The really sad part is that going by foot ends up being roughly on-par with traveling by elk, although it does depend on the terrain. The elk will outrun a seraph on foot with ease, however, a seraph traveling on foot can quickly cut through forests and climb over mountains that the elk will otherwise have to go around.

11 hours ago, cjc813 said:

That's a problem. The elk should be a useful upgrade for long-range travel.

It is a problem, yeah, though I would say the elk is still overall an upgrade. You're a lot faster on the flat areas and the elk autosteps up to two block heights. The elk can also carry a lot of stuff for you, and given some of the tweaks to the locations there are likely goodies you'll be wanting to bring back.

Overall though, I do agree with your sentiment--the elk needs some refining to feel like an especially comfortable way to travel. Tightening the turn radius and smoothing out incline traversal would help significantly.

[cjc813]

3 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

Tightening the turn radius and smoothing out incline traversal would help significantly.

I don't even necessarily mind how they handle inclines, considering the alternative: spamming spacebar and placing/removing rope ladders. It's an upgrade in that way, imo.

[Zane Mordien]

I use the elk mainly for the carry capacity as others have mentioned.  It absorbs the fall damage which is sort of nice as well. The turning hasn't bothered me much, but I see your point.

[Thorfinn]

At a guess, you need to play around with .\assets\survival\entities\land\hooved\elk-tamed.json

Its more involved than other creatures, probably for good reason. I'm guessing it's not as simple as just changing

				maxTurnAnglePerSec: 180

you will probably have to tweak the several instances of

				easeInSpeed: 3,
				easeOutSpeed: 10,

Either that or get used to the real-life fact that faster movement necessarily entails slower cornering...

Edited March 17, 2025 by Thorfinn