Combat is absolutely awful

[Dealman]

I'm not even gonna try and sugarcoat it, it straight up sucks.

• During storms there's like an 80% spawn rate of Bowtorns,at that point it doesn't matter what armour or weapons you have - they will obliterate you in seconds. So all you can really do is hide in a little hole and wait for it to be over, it's so horrendously detrimental to the gameplay and I'm absolutely shocked how it's still this bad.
• The loot is laughably bad without mods, some flax fibers, a rusty gear or a temporal gear every now and then. Really?
• And that's assuming you can even loot them because looting enemies is STILL horrendously desynced. You have to push the bodies around hoping you'll find a spot the server deems to be close enough to where it died - for it to be lootable.
• Rifts aren't interactable in any way, shape or form. They just stand there menacingly, to spawn enemies. They're boring and get frustrating when they constantly pop up just outside your house.
• The i-frame mechanic makes combat in multiplayer feel absolutely awful.
• Wolves are hilariously unbalanced compared to for example Bears, which historically has been a far bigger threat to humans.
• Sling is bugged and the stones will randomly go straight through enemies (may be desync and/or i-frame mechanic, feels awful regardless)

Like, I genuinely can not think of a single positive trait to the combat in this game. Which is sad because the whole lore thing the developers have been working on is fantastic, but it's all dragged down by this horrible combat system.

Combat desperately needs a complete overhaul, I want to feel excited about the next part of the lore but I honestly don't think I'll have the gusto unless the combat has been polished till then.

[Thorfinn]

12 minutes ago, Dealman said:

Like, I genuinely can not think of a single positive trait to the combat in this game.

Not even that it gives you a hankering to do some gardening or beekeeping?  

[Dealman]

27 minutes ago, Thorfinn said:

Not even that it gives you a hankering to do some gardening or beekeeping?  

Okay, that's perfectly fair. I do love my bees! 

[cjc813]

1 hour ago, Dealman said:

During storms there's like an 80% spawn rate of Bowtorns,at that point it doesn't matter what armour or weapons you have - they will obliterate you in seconds.

Oh look... it's this thread again.

Move. Shoot back. Take cover.

I've never been obliterated by Bowtorn in seconds. If there's a brazillion of them, I simply do not stand there and let them shoot me. I move. I go behind something. Sometimes both. Wild stuff.

It's *really* not hard.

Also, every new player gets mad at wolves. Learn how to deal with them. Stay alert, throw spears, and/or run.

FUR-THER-MORE...

Had you taken 5 seconds to scroll down, you'd see there's ALREADY a post on combat and/or a combat overhaul. On the front page. Right there. Right on it. Yep.

Edited May 3, 2025 by cjc813

[Dilan Rona]

I agree with the wolves. And with a few pit traps near by, I let them chase me, and collect them in a hole. Fresh meat for later in the year when I need it. Hides as well.

[Dealman]

56 minutes ago, cjc813 said:

Move. Shoot back. Take cover.

I've never been obliterated by Bowtorn in seconds. If there's a brazillion of them, I simply do not stand there and let them shoot me. I move. I go behind something. Sometimes both. Wild stuff.

It's *really* not hard.

Also, every new player gets mad at wolves. Learn how to deal with them. Stay alert, throw spears, and/or run.

FUR-THER-MORE...

Had you taken 5 seconds to scroll down, you'd see there's ALREADY a post on combat and/or a combat overhaul. On the front page. Right there. Right on it. Yep.

I love how you just assume that I stand there fingering myself, of course I move around a lot - but when there's 10+ of them, it really doesn't matter how much you move - the others will whittle you down. Especially when you also have to take navigating terrain into consideration.

Wow, stay alert and run away, what great advice... Can't believe I never thought of that... Especially when you have to lose momentum due to terrain whereas enemies in this game simply float up the terrain. The best solution early game is to dig pits and abuse their bad pathfinding to trap them, if that's good gameplay to you, well then you don't have very high standards. Still, why should wolves be this disgustingly overpowered, whereas bears are about as big a threat as a small swarm of bees? Why should we have to fill our entire inventory with spears for even the slightest reliable method of dealing with them? Their damage is absurd as is their attack speed, they're far more dangerous than many drifter variants which just reeks of poor balance.

Okay? There's no rules against it so  If you can tell what it's about from the title alone and you clearly don't care, why bother replying? Keep scrolling my dude.

I'm all for having a discussion, but your holier-than-thou elitist attitude isn't gonna contribute much.

35 minutes ago, Dilan Rona said:

I agree with the wolves. And with a few pit traps near by, I let them chase me, and collect them in a hole. Fresh meat for later in the year when I need it. Hides as well.

Yup, this is what we did early on as well. Whilst effective, it really feels more as if you're cheesing the game than anything. I want the wolves to be a threat, but there's so many ways to go about it instead of just having them outrun the player and killing them in 2-3 very quick hits.

The sling is an effective weapon early game, but sometimes the stones just phase through them.

Edited May 3, 2025 by Dealman

[Zane Mordien]

8 hours ago, Dealman said:

The best solution early game is to dig pits and abuse their bad pathfinding to trap them...

I agree, it's stupid. I vomit a little in my mouth every time I work on my temporal storm cheesing base. 

[Nymous]

5 hours ago, Zane Mordien said:

I agree, it's stupid. I vomit a little in my mouth every time I work on my temporal storm cheesing base. 

 

[Big Shasta]

I'll offer my solidarity to this post as well, especially since old boy showed up talking about "this post again". I've been playing VS off and on for a while now and I've started my own fair shares of vanilla worlds, done a LOT of early game stuff and - yes - I believe wolves have been and are currently - RIDICULOUSLY BROKEN... As evidenced by any number of posts to the effect, especially those with any screens. 

The harm is in how other players handle these opinions. Many argue this to the very premise - that the game is somehow totally cool and playable as is. It might very well be for some folks who are interested in solo'ing this game 100% and who enjoy doing whatever it takes to win in a game... Seems like that's a lot of people ngl.

Then there are the rest of us, who understand business and products, what is sold vs what is actually provided, etc. Wolves, in their current state - are a JOKE and a BAD JOKE at that.

When I buy a buddy this game and pay for a VS server, bring him along with me as we start a mud hut - just trying to sell him on the idea of this game... and 3-4 wolves attack us - honestly REGARDLESS of the save REGARDLESS of biome REGARDLESS of WHERE we base - Once we hang out for a minute and build something - WHOOP THERE THEY IS. This pit has SEVENN wolves. No Mods at all PURE vanilla server, my buddy and I JUST made a dirt house, this is about 100m from our home. Today I tore down the fence because ANOTHER 4 with 2 pups spawned in the woods right next to these. I don't kill the ones in the pit btw since afaik that will cause them to respawn... So there are STILL MORE WOLVES, and this is again - a TINY little chunk of land with NO farming, not any big amount of rabbits or any REASON for there to be THIS MANY PREDATORS...

Except ya know "WhooHooo WELP YOU bought the hardest survival game ever MADE buddy what's wrong? - ya ain't MAN enuff to ENJOY the PAIN??"

The Devs look foolish. This is a horrible state to leave the game in - and it's never NOT been this way... Personally, I don't play with monsters or temporal stuff... Because I'm WAITING FOR THIS GAME TO BE FINISHED FIRST, and I'm not sure that will ever happen! ....As it stands, when I buy this game for friends: I look dumb. There are patently NOT enough spears and improvised armors available - there is not enough at the start of the GAME, to survive competing every 12 game hours with families of wolves - right outside of anywhere you are especially your base. It's exhausting and completely NUKES early game exploration and adventure! Again - I never play with mods and this is my impression for years, what when did I get this game? ... Years ago.  You ain't crazy OP.

Edited May 4, 2025 by Big Shasta

[Big Shasta]

Can I just add that building big moats and ditches to catch EVERYTHING is also a bit of a lazy approach to "gameplay"? ... My Opinion whatever but ... The ads don't show anything at all like the way people ACTUALLY play this game... and how can you play it like we see on the ads? Hell I can't even turn OFF wolves much less lower how many there are in the world at any given time!!!

[Thorfinn]

My big complaint about wolves is their respawn rate. They kill all the herbivores before I can off them all. If the herbivores respawned at the same rate as the wolves, I wouldn't care. Wolves are otherwise a nothingburger.

Not sure why people think the only way to deal with storms is to cheese them. True, you can't use the same old small, flat arena you used in 1.19. You kind of need elevation changes so the terrain eats all the bowtorn missiles. Which means you need to learn how to time your jumps on upslopes. You also have to  leave some of the bushes to slow down the shivers. Or add some trees or something to your arena. And rather than just letting them wander away like used to be enough, you now have to despawn the ones you don't want to deal with. Movement is still the key, like @cjc813 says. It's just you need to practice a few new skills.

It's true that combat is different in rogue-likes and ARPGs. In VS, combat is not the key to progression until the very late game, when you start considering Jonas tech. Until then, combat is best avoided.

[LadyWYT]

On 5/3/2025 at 9:39 AM, Dealman said:

During storms there's like an 80% spawn rate of Bowtorns,at that point it doesn't matter what armour or weapons you have - they will obliterate you in seconds. So all you can really do is hide in a little hole and wait for it to be over, it's so horrendously detrimental to the gameplay and I'm absolutely shocked how it's still this bad.

I think bowtorns and temporal storms are a case of buggy bits of code that haven't been fully swatted yet. I've been playing on 1.20.7 and the storms have been a LOT better in terms of monster ratios, being mostly drifters and shivers and almost no bowtorn. I say "almost", because my friend and I have been absolutely dumped on by armies of bowtorn spawning sometimes, to the point he has to go into creative with the admin blade and clean them up. I've noticed that when those armies spawn though, there's always higher rift activity, with rifts nearby that churn out nothing but bowtorn. Doesn't matter if it's day or night. And since those bowtorn are spawned from a rift and not the temporal storm, they will linger after the storm instead of poofing from existence.

In other words, fix the rift spawns, and I think the bowtorn stop being a problem during temporal storms.

On 5/3/2025 at 9:39 AM, Dealman said:

The loot is laughably bad without mods, some flax fibers, a rusty gear or a temporal gear every now and then. Really?

I'm pretty sure this is a deliberate design decision to keep the monsters as an esoteric environmental hazard constantly looming in the background, rather than entities you actively want to hunt. Subnautica made similar decisions with its monsters--they don't drop anything or have cool death animations, so players don't have a lot of incentive to go hunt them. You can, of course, despite the lack of weapons, but overall they remain an environmental hazard that's best avoided in most cases than confronted head-on.

Vintage Story is a bit different, in that you actually have the means to counter enemies. In most cases, it's still to your advantage to avoid combat if you can, since injury increases your death risk(which can have potentially severe penalties) and wears out gear faster. Sometimes you need to deal with the enemies though, whether to complete story objectives or otherwise secure an area, and in those cases the stuff the enemies drop is just a nice little bonus every now and then(and not enough to unbalance progression).

On 5/3/2025 at 9:39 AM, Dealman said:

And that's assuming you can even loot them because looting enemies is STILL horrendously desynced. You have to push the bodies around hoping you'll find a spot the server deems to be close enough to where it died - for it to be lootable.

On 5/3/2025 at 9:39 AM, Dealman said:

The i-frame mechanic makes combat in multiplayer feel absolutely awful.

On 5/3/2025 at 9:39 AM, Dealman said:

Sling is bugged and the stones will randomly go straight through enemies (may be desync and/or i-frame mechanic, feels awful regardless)

Probably symptoms of hitboxes that need some tuning. The faster creatures tend to be harder to hit, especially if they move erratically, however, I'm not sure that the hitboxes always match the size of the creature they belong to. I'm guessing the hitbox sizes are probably why some attacks miss when it feels like they should have hit.

It's something that I would expect to improve with time. I've not looked at hitboxes in other games, but my guess is that in some other games the hitboxes might be a bit bigger than the creatures they belong to, making it much easier to land attacks.

On 5/3/2025 at 9:39 AM, Dealman said:

Rifts aren't interactable in any way, shape or form. They just stand there menacingly, to spawn enemies. They're boring and get frustrating when they constantly pop up just outside your house.

This is something that may or may not change with a future update. Personally, I don't expect to be entering rifts, outside of specific story pieces. There's not a lot of lore on the Rust World yet, but what's been presented so far has made it out to be a place that you REALLY don't want to be. I also suspect that the majority of the game is meant to focus on the natural world, and from a narrative standpoint it's a lot easier to keep the Rust World esoteric if it's not something you can just visit on a whim or otherwise familiarize yourself with.

On 5/3/2025 at 9:39 AM, Dealman said:

Wolves are hilariously unbalanced compared to for example Bears, which historically has been a far bigger threat to humans.

To my knowledge, creature behavior is something the devs have been trying to work on. I do agree with @Thorfinn, in that I don't think wolves are really a big problem for the most part, outside of some goofy spawn mechanics. There's potentially lore reasons for wildlife being so hostile(though I think it's a point that hasn't been fully explained), but outside of that wolves are mostly a major hazard for brand new players and veterans who get overconfident.

I'm guessing that we may see some major changes to wolf behavior once wolf taming is implemented. After all, if you're going to domesticate the beasts, they do need to be at least somewhat approachable(likely once certain conditions are met).

[Nymous]

9 hours ago, Big Shasta said:

Can I just add that building big moats and ditches to catch EVERYTHING is also a bit of a lazy approach to "gameplay"? ... My Opinion whatever but ... The ads don't show anything at all like the way people ACTUALLY play this game... and how can you play it like we see on the ads? Hell I can't even turn OFF wolves much less lower how many there are in the world at any given time!!!

There are ads?

[cjc813]

On 5/3/2025 at 12:06 PM, Dealman said:

I love how you just assume that I stand there fingering myself, of course I move around a lot - but when there's 10+ of them, it really doesn't matter how much you move - the others will whittle you down.

You said they'd "obliterate you in seconds" regardless of gear. The only way that happens is if a person isn't moving. I was just responding to what you said in the OP.

If you want to talk about them "whittling you down," then ok. That's a different issue. And I'd respond to that objection honestly, but you wouldn't like it.

[cjc813]

On 5/3/2025 at 12:06 PM, Dealman said:

The best solution early game is to dig pits and abuse their bad pathfinding to trap them, if that's good gameplay to you, well then you don't have very high standards. Still, why should wolves be this disgustingly overpowered, whereas bears are about as big a threat as a small swarm of bees? Why should we have to fill our entire inventory with spears for even the slightest reliable method of dealing with them?

Really not trying to sound like a jerk, but...

a) Digging a pit in a digging/building/crafting game strikes me as a valid strategy. I don't tend to use it, but I don't see it as an exploit.

b) Bears aren't a threat for you? Genuinely curious about that one.

c) It takes 3ish well placed spears to down a wolf as a commoner. That's far from an "inventory full" of spears. Early game, I usually run with 3 flint spears, improvised armor, and a crude shield. My survivability is not 100%, but it's pretty good. I also prefer playing as a hunter so I can just run if I want to.

d) Wolves are pretty easy to avoid a lot of the time, in my experience. You can hear and see them from afar, especially if you avoid forests while undergeared. When I first started and ran around willy nilly, yeah, I died a lot to wolves. Not trying to be "elitist," but once I learned to pay attention, wolves became less "overpowered."

I honestly think wolves add a lot to the game the way they're currently balanced. I wouldn't be sad if the spawns got reduced/tweaked, but, once ya get used to them, they're not overwhelming to deal with by any stretch of the imagination.

[cjc813]

10 hours ago, Big Shasta said:

The harm is in how other players handle these opinions. Many argue this to the very premise - that the game is somehow totally cool and playable as is. It might very well be for some folks who are interested in solo'ing this game 100% and who enjoy doing whatever it takes to win in a game... Seems like that's a lot of people ngl.

Then there are the rest of us, who understand business and products, what is sold vs what is actually provided, etc. Wolves, in their current state - are a JOKE and a BAD JOKE at that.

I think wolves in their current implementation add to the game, and the game would be less fun if they were nerfed. To me, they're a fun challenge and make early game survival more interesting. But you obviously know better, Mr. Buisness and Products, so I guess my opinion is invalid?

To be honest, tho... I don't think they'll get nerfed any time soon. People have been saying wolves are "broken" for a long time, first of all. Secondly, VS bills itself as "uncompromising survival," and hyper lethal wildlife is part of that. I don't see the devs "compromising" on that any time soon.

Third, and I'm not trying to be sarcastic, but there are plenty of settings to either delay enemy spawns or make mobs less dangerous. Everyone can play VS the way they want, without the devs having to "fix" anything.

EDIT: I agree with you on one thing tho, Shasta. Early game armor kinda sucks. It'd be nice to have hide armor or something to hold you over before you get leather or gambeson.

Edited May 4, 2025 by cjc813

[LadyWYT]

49 minutes ago, Nymous said:

There are ads?

I would assume by "ads" they meant the Youtube trailers. Which personally, what's showcased in the trailers fits my general experiences with the game pretty well, though I would say a lot of trailer showcase vs. actual player experience hinges heavily on individual playstyle.

[Zane Mordien]

The wolf spawn mechanics are a little much. It's been awhile but I've had to kill 40 wolves in one location before. That was just crazy. 

2 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

I think bowtorns and temporal storms are a case of buggy bits of code that haven't been fully swatted yet. I've been playing on 1.20.7 and the storms have been a LOT better in terms of monster ratios, being mostly drifters and shivers and almost no bowtorn. I say "almost", because my friend and I have been absolutely dumped on by armies of bowtorn spawning sometimes, to the point he has to go into creative with the admin blade and clean them up. I've noticed that when those armies spawn though, there's always higher rift activity, with rifts nearby that churn out nothing but bowtorn. Doesn't matter if it's day or night. And since those bowtorn are spawned from a rift and not the temporal storm, they will linger after the storm instead of poofing from existence.

I

I thought @Thorfinn posted the code once and it had different ratios and the storm you get isn't always the same. Some storms are 90% drifters but some are 50% bowtorns. So it's just luck on which one you get. 

 

2 hours ago, cjc813 said:

You said they'd "obliterate you in seconds" regardless of gear. The only way that happens is if a person isn't moving. I was just responding to what you said in the OP.

If you want to talk about them "whittling you down," then ok. That's a different issue. And I'd respond to that objection honestly, but you wouldn't like it.

If you get hit by a nightmare or other tier 4 bowtorn it nearly one shots you. If you are running constantly so you are never surprised by a bowtorn then that's nice but you aren't doing anything else if 10 of them are surrounding you firing at you. Although my last couple storms I haven't seen 10 bowtorns anymore so I'm not sure if they adjusted the ratios or if I just got lucky on my storms. 

 

I guess for me when it comes to the bowtorn I wish they were a little less accurate at maximum range or they did arrow damage instead of spear damage. I know they aren't spear vs arrow in actual damage but you get my point.

1 hour ago, cjc813 said:

a) Digging a pit in a digging/building/crafting game strikes me as a valid strategy. I don't tend to use it, but I don't see it as an exploit.

 It's just stupid that you have to do it. Not that  you have to do anything. I personally don't put anything in a pit except storms, but I understand why people do. I've just gotten really good at my aim with a spear, but not everybody is going to have that same aim. 

[cjc813]

18 minutes ago, Zane Mordien said:

If you get hit by a nightmare or other tier 4 bowtorn it nearly one shots you. If you are running constantly so you are never surprised by a bowtorn then that's nice but you aren't doing anything else if 10 of them are surrounding you firing at you. Although my last couple storms I haven't seen 10 bowtorns anymore so I'm not sure if they adjusted the ratios or if I just got lucky on my storms. 

This is always how these conversations go. 

We start talking about one thing, then, somehow we end up discussing wildly unrealistic edge cases that are so far beside the point it's not funny.

Yes, if multiple nightmare bowtorn shoot you, you're going to die. Therefore... combat is broken? Bowtorn spawns are broken?

What are we even talking about?

Edited May 4, 2025 by cjc813

[Nymous]

I know we each have our own play style but I want to know why someone is running out in an open field far from shelter, ignoring all messages about temporal storms.

[LadyWYT]

33 minutes ago, Zane Mordien said:

I thought @Thorfinn posted the code once and it had different ratios and the storm you get isn't always the same. Some storms are 90% drifters but some are 50% bowtorns. So it's just luck on which one you get. 

There could still be some storm patterns that are mostly bowtorn; I'm just speaking for what I've experienced recently in the game. Overall, the monster ratios feel a lot better than they felt when 1.20 first launched. When armies of bowtorn do spawn, it seems to happen during periods of high rift activity during temporal storms, and the spawns seem to happen in specific spots rather than randomly around the landscape.

Hence why I suspect that rifts themselves might be the cause of the issue during temporal storms; they seem to spawning nothing but bowtorn when active.

16 minutes ago, Nymous said:

I know we each have our own play style but I want to know why someone is running out in an open field far from shelter, ignoring all messages about temporal storms.

Some of us are a little special like that. Honestly, I don't know why people do stuff like that, but everyone has their moments of it(myself included). Generally when I read about it in a post, I tend to chalk it up to poor planning/execution on the player's part, rather than jump to blaming the game itself. Depends heavily on the context.

[ifoz]

To anyone talking about how wolves are OP, keep in mind that wolves are currently bugged. The way they are meant to work is that wolves have three potential attacks, they choose one, then it has a 1.5 second cooldown. However, all three attacks have *separate* cooldowns, meaning they can spam attacks really quickly and shred you like a chainsaw.

[Zane Mordien]

3 hours ago, cjc813 said:

This is always how these conversations go. 

We start talking about one thing, then, somehow we end up discussing wildly unrealistic edge cases that are so far beside the point it's not funny.

Yes, if multiple nightmare bowtorn shoot you, you're going to die. Therefore... combat is broken? Bowtorn spawns are broken?

What are we even talking about?

If you don't like the conversation feel free to leave it.<insert lame emoji here>

I don't see how that is a edge case. Tier 4 bowtorns spawn the same as tier 4 drifters in storms. Been killed by them along with tier 4 shivers. The temporal storm as it is to me and many others doesn't mask sense. What is the reward for the risk? Worthless temporal gears and jonas junk parts? Are they just suppose to kill you for fun to prove the game is scary?  

 

I tire of the arguments that it can't be as easy as running around spearing them like it used to be in 1.19 and the game is not a combat game. IT'S A GAME - there has to be something fun about it's mechanics and the combat has to make sense when every major update doubles down on combat.

Temporal storms in 1.19 were fun to me. Yes, they were to easy when you learned how to run around and spear them, but I had fun running around trying to kill as many of the idiots as I could. The reward was just fun because you don't need that many Temporal gears anyway and jonas parts aren't worth the effort. Now in 1.20, I deal with the storms but they are -0- fun. I get a couple temporal gears and the rest is just misery or boredom waiting out the storm. 

[LadyWYT]

26 minutes ago, Zane Mordien said:

What is the reward for the risk? Worthless temporal gears and jonas junk parts?

Yes, though I think it's underwhelming as a reward right now since there's not really that much you can do with those items, hence why it's also relatively easy to stockpile them. Once the update for late-game tech arrives, then I suspect getting temporal gears and Jonas parts will be a bit more exciting, as there will be a lot more that you can do with those items. Which having more uses for those items is also going to push players to brave the temporal storms and deep dark places of the world in order to acquire those rarities.

32 minutes ago, Zane Mordien said:

Are they just suppose to kill you for fun to prove the game is scary?  

Yes, to an extent. They're there for narrative purposes, as well as a way to provide an environmental hazard that fits the setting and dispense certain pieces of loot. If it was just a matter of killing players, that job could be easily done by bears, outlaws, dinosaurs...any number of things.

36 minutes ago, Zane Mordien said:

I tire of the arguments that it can't be as easy as running around spearing them like it used to be in 1.19 and the game is not a combat game. IT'S A GAME - there has to be something fun about it's mechanics and the combat has to make sense when every major update doubles down on combat.

Temporal storms in 1.19 were fun to me. Yes, they were to easy when you learned how to run around and spear them, but I had fun running around trying to kill as many of the idiots as I could. The reward was just fun because you don't need that many Temporal gears anyway and jonas parts aren't worth the effort. Now in 1.20, I deal with the storms but they are -0- fun. I get a couple temporal gears and the rest is just misery or boredom waiting out the storm. 

I think some sort of Jonas tech weapon or two might offer an interesting solution to the problem. If it's a powerful late game item, that gives the player a good goal to work towards without trivializing the struggle of the early storms. Plus if said weapon has limited charges and is refueled via temporal gears, that not only gives players another use for temporal gears, but also means that they'll need to be careful about when they choose to use the weapon, as overuse could deplete their supply of gears too quickly. It's the kind of thing I could easily see being a oneshot weapon for most low-tier enemies(maybe even most common enemies in general), so that players can easily mow through hordes of enemies as long as it has charge. Difficult to acquire, limited use, but ridiculously fun if you can get your hands on one.

[Thorfinn]

8 hours ago, cjc813 said:

b) Bears aren't a threat for you? Genuinely curious about that one.

Bears are not that big of a threat as long as you don't trip over them right behind a tree or something. They are pretty hard to evade on large stretches of flat ground, but fortunately there are not a lot of those in the game.

But if one is unafraid of the bears, I guess I don't understand complaining about wolves. Pretty sure browns outclass wolves in every respect.

One upside of  the (presumably) bugged wolf respawns is how soon you replace linen sacks with leather backpacks. 

--

With the new, improved sailboat and a 70%-ish landcover, you can watch spawning on long stretches of coastline with no risk. I think there are a whole lot more spawns than there used to be, but I do not see anything close to 80% bowtorns. I'm almost certain that the bowtorn hordes are for one reason -- while drifters will wander (usually away) if you are only 20 blocks away, boworn seek you out up to 30. That's a huge difference. If you aren't actively killing/despawning them, they will build up to the point you may well not be able to survive. At least without some protected means of getting out of their range like a tunnel or a bridge or a lane or something. But you can use their orders to stay in range against them with some creative fencing and a somewhat largish base.

Edited May 5, 2025 by Thorfinn