Criticisms from a Passionate Fan

[Moony_Otter]

I love this game, I've spent weeks playing Vintage Story, and I've barely tapped into the lore events yet, just working on my various home tasks and building up my farm of crops, animals, and tools.

However, as someone that has played this game for a good while, I have a few criticisms; criticisms that I make as a fan whom hopes for these perceived issues to be improved on.

Bears. I think bears are a bit overpowered for the game they're in; I want to clarify, bears on their own are great! A fantastic and immersive way of threatening livestock, difficult enough to avoid yet fair enough to be an enjoyable achievement when killing one. However, when you put that incredibly designed threat into Vintage Story's world, that's when it becomes too much. Vintage Story's world-- especially where bears are most common-- is intentionally hostile to navigate, with foliage making it difficult to see, bushes being difficult to sprint through reliably, and Vintage Story's movement mechanics being not well made for speed (more on that in a second). Pair that with an enemy that can ambush you, makes little noise, has better sight than you (and will therefore see you before you see it 80% of the time), runs faster than you, takes minimal knockback, deals absurd damage to you, and can navigate the hostile terrain much more reliably than you, while being very common and hard to see in the brush (especially if it's lying down)... bears make exploring very tedious and annoying, and can feel like essentially an RNG 'you die now' whenever you're bordering a forest.
Is it realistic? Yes, bears are better than you and them ambushing you makes sense. But is it good game design? No, randomly being punished with near-guaranteed death just because you existed in an area with little to no indicators of danger other than "bears can spawn here" is poor design.
Personally, I think bears should have a better indicator of their presence, or some way of better escaping them. I think they should remain a massive threat, but one that RNG check guarantees your death unless you go in prepared for combat (which isn't common in a game where you sometimes need to explore thousands of blocks while having a limited inventory) I think makes exploring worse. Whenever there are wolves, I think "Ooh, I better stay away from those howls" or "I can knock it back with my spear while I run away!" Whenever there are bears, I think "Ok, well that's annoying." or "Well, guess I'm dead, I'm not looking forward to the next 10 minutes of just getting my stuff back only to maybe die to another bear." Bears should be balanced like a more threatening wolf, but right now they're a "you got unlucky, you die now" enemy. An incredibly rare instance in Vintage Story where I feel cheated, and like I had little to no options other than get more lucky next time.

Climbing. Vintage Story, believe it or not, is a voxel game. But, it's a voxel game with movement mechanics not fit for a voxel game; specifically, jumping and climbing blocks, or the lack thereof.
I don't want to compare Vintage Story to Minecraft, but in this case it's warranted, because Minecraft has a block stepping mechanic that I think Vintage Story should adopt. 
In Vintage Story, if you jump up a block and the very edge of your collision box grazes a block, your momentum is being halted or thrown off. In Minecraft, your momentum is retained when you jump up a block; when you jump up a block, hit the side of it, then go above it, your velocity isn't stopped, which makes climbing blocks in Minecraft feel so much more natural and intuitive. In Vintage Story, climbing up blocks; especially when you're trying to sprint to somewhere; it can feel like a chore being constantly stopped by the side of a block, or being thrown off to the side when you try and jump up a block at an angle and just clip the edge of the block.

Starting Copper. In early copper age-- before you obtain and crush your first copper ores-- the grind is extremely tedious and unfun. On my first playthrough, I didn't know I could explore around to find copper bits and the nodes underneath them, so I spent 4 HOURS panning for enough copper to create a pickaxe, prospecting pick, and hammer. That's 60 pieces of copper; panning was such a tedious chore. I nearly stopped playing, the only reason I kept going is because I felt stubborn on that particular day.
Even in my newest playthrough, where I did search for copper bits rather than panning and kept note of the nodes underneath them, it was still annoying to get both the pickaxe to mine the ore, and hammer to crush the ore.
I think that some alternate way of crushing ore-- even just copper-- that doesn't involve another metal tool would be great for rushing into proper ore mining and the copper age. Maybe a quern or something? Maybe smashing the ores against a rock surface, which would take several tries to break it open? Maybe you could do a similar process to knapping or cleaning up an Iron Bloom? Anything to make grinding towards being able to mine and use ores a little less tedious.

Rifts. Honestly, this is less of a balancing criticism and more of just an art design or spectacle criticism; I think it would be really cool if there were more alternatives to Rifts. Different Rift types, different Rift sizes; something that makes you pay attention to the Rifts near you more than just taking note of their position and how light or dark it is. I dunno, I just think it would be awesome to have the current Rifts we have now be the common type, but there's a rare Black Rift or something that spawns harder enemies or something; just to make Rifts feel more like a weather event than a "is it light or dark right now" check whenever Rift activity is high.

Bowtorn and Shivers. I like these enemies, and I have little to say as criticism against them, except for the fact that there sometimes feels like there are situations where you have very little to combat them; specifically in caves. A Bowtorn in a large cave can shut down an area if it happens to have literally any verticality, as climbing up to a Bowtorn is just asking to be shot at, and climbing down to a Bowtorn is a massive risk in the darkness of a cave, as you don't know what other enemies could be down there. If you can get right up to them, they're a well-balanced enemy as you have to either get out of their line of sight or close the gap, but put them somewhere where their 'disadvantage state' of them running away is extremely risky and difficult to get to, and it can sometimes feel like wherever they are is essentially a no-go zone.
Shivers are in a similar state, but to a lesser degree. If you can get them in a place where you can fight them, an open and flat space to run in circles around them, then they're not bad! But, in a cave where any open level ground is a rare luxury, and fighting Shivers can really feel unfair at times. And, Vintage Story is a difficult game, but rarely is it unfair. Except with bears. And sometimes Bowtorn and Shivers.

I want to be clear that I could be wrong about these, could be missing something, but I voice my criticisms in hopes that maybe it helps to improve this game. Other than these things, I love this game, there's a reason I come back to this game all the time, I love making my keep and I love exploring and farming and mining! But these-- especially bears while exploring-- can cause me to genuinely not enjoy playing this game.

Edited September 27, 2025 by Moony_Otter
I didn't know Ctrl + Enter would just post the whole thing, I wanted to do Shift + Enter.

[Mantisek]

The answer to bears is foodstep sounds, and all animals should have them.

[Bumber]

They should make loud bear sounds as soon as they notice you.

IIRC, the game lore implies wolves and bears aren't stalking you for food. They're actually really, really irate about the whole apocalypse thing.

Edited September 27, 2025 by Bumber

[Bruno Willis]

1 hour ago, Mantisek said:

The answer to bears is foodstep sounds, and all animals should have them.

I would love it if bears scratched trees to mark their territory, then spent their days going from scratch-mark to scratch-mark, hunting when something gets near. They'd still be quiet and terrifying, but it would be more of a "Oh shit, is that a scratch mark on that tree behind me? What have I done!" than a straight up "is the bear chasing me yet?" More of a slow building fear you know?

I also think that would be a good way to generate new resin logs (I've said this before, it is my dearest wish).

On the other hand, I think you get used to bears. They really aren't that bad once your eye is trained in to spot them, and you're ready run at any instant (I never wear armor above ground for this reason. What's the point of being able to take 2 hits from a bear when it's faster than you? I'd rather be able to run away).

[Mantisek]

56 minutes ago, Bruno Willis said:

I would love it if bears scratched trees to mark their territory, then spent their days going from scratch-mark to scratch-mark, hunting when something gets near. They'd still be quiet and terrifying, but it would be more of a "Oh shit, is that a scratch mark on that tree behind me? What have I done!" than a straight up "is the bear chasing me yet?" More of a slow building fear you know?

I also think that would be a good way to generate new resin logs (I've said this before, it is my dearest wish).

On the other hand, I think you get used to bears. They really aren't that bad once your eye is trained in to spot them, and you're ready run at any instant (I never wear armor above ground for this reason. What's the point of being able to take 2 hits from a bear when it's faster than you? I'd rather be able to run away).

Dedicating an enormous amount of your inventory to hold armor just so you can outrun stealth bears and wolves is a terrible counterplay.

[Kaldo]

I've gone through the early copper grind twice so far and I still agree that it's not really fun. In fact it seems like they intentionally designed it to trap newbies and make their lives even harder lol. You have to know to search for nugget locations, to mark them after gathering them, which tools to make (and not make), not to dig too much because copper tools fall apart so fast... Even when I knew about these it still wasn't a very fun experience to be stuck with flint tools for so long. It's even worse if you start to get into the experienced mindset of rushing bronze or even iron.

Agreed on ranged enemies being too annoying to fight. Bears are fine since you can trap them easily and cheese their AI, but I don't like that they can jump that high - makes my fences ugly. Most bears I ran into ignored me so it wasnt that bad for exploration.

I also dislike rifts and their random spawning on top of my base so I disabled them on my 2nd game. I wish I was incentivized to build defensive structures that work, like perimeter walls, palisades, moats or w/e, instead of just spamming everything in light sources or disabling it outright when I don't want to do that.

I know mods can fix some issues and people can customize the game themselves, but I still think the game should have solid vanilla design before people start tweaking it, and in some areas like these I do agree it's a bit lacking. Progression with building materials and armors/clothing is also a bit iffy for newbies imho.

[Bruno Willis]

44 minutes ago, Mantisek said:

Dedicating an enormous amount of your inventory to hold armor just so you can outrun stealth bears and wolves is a terrible counterplay.

Don't carry armor. Shields are great! They don't slow you down, and they make rust-monsters pretty risk-free. Armor is for the depths and bosses (in my opinion). 

36 minutes ago, Kaldo said:

Even when I knew about these it still wasn't a very fun experience to be stuck with flint tools for so long. It's even worse if you start to get into the experienced mindset of rushing bronze or even iron.

I've been in steel for a while and I'm still knapping flint axes and the occasional shovel. I don't know, I feel like there's something satisfying about taking things slow.

33 minutes ago, Kaldo said:

I wish I was incentivized to build defensive structures that work, like perimeter walls, palisades, moats or w/e, instead of just spamming everything in light sources or disabling it outright when I don't want to do that.

This for sure. I seriously haven't noticed any trouble with foes in my home space (except that time two bears got stuck in my walled garden - delicious), but I think it would be more fun if perimeter walls and palisades were more encouraged by game-rules than just for the aesthetics and lore. 

[Lollard]

I don't like how long searches can take in this game. Finding lime-producing rocks, finding milk animals to catch, finding elk to catch, finding the type of trader you want, finding the rock type you want to build with, it's too common for these to take so many hours. And when you finally find them it's also too common for them to be so far away it takes an hour to go to them and return home. Teleporters that could remedy this are too rare and unpredictable.

Also so much content is locked behind holding sprint + W for 4 hours to reach a different climate zone. It's cool that the world feels big but this is ridiculous for gameplay. It's remedy-able through custom world settings but most players won't know to do that and by the time they realize they can, they'll already have invested too much time on the sub-optimal world to scrap it. This game feels like it's designed for masses of players to co-operate and optimize the work, not for single player.

The solution I'd suggest is being able to ask NPCs about rock strata and animal habitats in a wide area, and a more convenient teleporter system.

Edited September 27, 2025 by Lollard

[Steel General]

9 hours ago, Moony_Otter said:

In Minecraft, your momentum is retained when you jump up a block; when you jump up a block, hit the side of it, then go above it, your velocity isn't stopped, which makes climbing blocks in Minecraft feel so much more natural and intuitive. In Vintage Story, climbing up blocks; especially when you're trying to sprint to somewhere; it can feel like a chore being constantly stopped by the side of a block, or being thrown off to the side when you try and jump up a block at an angle and just clip the edge of the block.

This is the jank I most wish to be fixed. I am of the opinion that the solution is to bevel the character's collision box.

To add to your examples, I don't like getting stuck on stairs; I like even less getting stuck on the transition from tilled soil to soil.

[LadyWYT]

First off, welcome to the forums!

9 hours ago, Moony_Otter said:

Bears. I think bears are a bit overpowered for the game they're in; I want to clarify, bears on their own are great!

Only partial quoting in some cases to save on space--bears are fine as-is, for the most part, though I do agree they could use some footsteps or louder noise to announce themselves from time to time. There was a mod I used a while back that changed the models and added more bear noises, which the added noise really helped make them easy to notice. 

As it stands though...yes, bears are incredibly strong, but that is realistically what bears are, and the player does have ways to deal with them. It just takes some extra care in the planning instead of bum-rushing the bears with stone age gear and expecting to come out on top every time. Essentially, the bears are the boss of the surface world. I will also note that it is possible to outrun most bears as long as the player isn't weighed down too much by armor and decent at navigating terrain--the one exception to this rule might be polar bears.

The only other thing I'd really change here is adjusting the bear's hitbox; the hitbox itself is big enough, but it's possible for the player to clip inside the hitbox and thus be unable to actually hit the bear. This particular detail means that bears can just sit on the player and not get hit, while still being able to maul the player themselves.

9 hours ago, Moony_Otter said:

Climbing. Vintage Story, believe it or not, is a voxel game. But, it's a voxel game with movement mechanics not fit for a voxel game; specifically, jumping and climbing blocks, or the lack thereof.
I don't want to compare Vintage Story to Minecraft, but in this case it's warranted, because Minecraft has a block stepping mechanic that I think Vintage Story should adopt. 
In Vintage Story, if you jump up a block and the very edge of your collision box grazes a block, your momentum is being halted or thrown off. In Minecraft, your momentum is retained when you jump up a block; when you jump up a block, hit the side of it, then go above it, your velocity isn't stopped, which makes climbing blocks in Minecraft feel so much more natural and intuitive. In Vintage Story, climbing up blocks; especially when you're trying to sprint to somewhere; it can feel like a chore being constantly stopped by the side of a block, or being thrown off to the side when you try and jump up a block at an angle and just clip the edge of the block.

I agree that it would be nice to have as an accessibility option, but it shouldn't be something baked in by default. I remember when this feature was introduced to Minecraft, and it was one of the first things I disabled in the options as I absolutely positively hate it!  While pressing spacebar each time to climb up a steep hill or mountain can get tedious, I much prefer the greater control I have over my movement, than the accidental missteps that tend to occur when the game is just assuming that I wanted to step up certain heights.

In any case, for those that wish this kind of function in their game, there is a mod for that: https://mods.vintagestory.at/stepupcontinued

10 hours ago, Moony_Otter said:

Starting Copper. In early copper age-- before you obtain and crush your first copper ores-- the grind is extremely tedious and unfun. On my first playthrough, I didn't know I could explore around to find copper bits and the nodes underneath them, so I spent 4 HOURS panning for enough copper to create a pickaxe, prospecting pick, and hammer. That's 60 pieces of copper; panning was such a tedious chore. I nearly stopped playing, the only reason I kept going is because I felt stubborn on that particular day.
Even in my newest playthrough, where I did search for copper bits rather than panning and kept note of the nodes underneath them, it was still annoying to get both the pickaxe to mine the ore, and hammer to crush the ore.
I think that some alternate way of crushing ore-- even just copper-- that doesn't involve another metal tool would be great for rushing into proper ore mining and the copper age. Maybe a quern or something? Maybe smashing the ores against a rock surface, which would take several tries to break it open? Maybe you could do a similar process to knapping or cleaning up an Iron Bloom? Anything to make grinding towards being able to mine and use ores a little less tedious.

This was me too when I started, except I opted for panning because it was a very safe method to get what I wanted. Getting from stone age to copper also gets much easier as one becomes more experienced at the game; otherwise, that initial grind is part of what makes the first set of copper tools so satisfying to acquire. It was a lot of hard work, and they're significantly better than stone!

I will also note that the quern requires a hammer and chisel to craft in order to give the player more reason to cast a copper anvil, so grinding ores in the quern isn't going to be an option. I think what I would opt for instead, is to increase the ore drops from panning sand/gravel just a bit--ie, give copper ore a chance to drop two nuggets instead of just one. Still a tedious process if one relies on panning(which is fair, given how safe panning is), but it also makes it a bit more attractive if you want just a bit of ore without needing to find a deposit.

10 hours ago, Moony_Otter said:

Rifts. Honestly, this is less of a balancing criticism and more of just an art design or spectacle criticism; I think it would be really cool if there were more alternatives to Rifts. Different Rift types, different Rift sizes; something that makes you pay attention to the Rifts near you more than just taking note of their position and how light or dark it is. I dunno, I just think it would be awesome to have the current Rifts we have now be the common type, but there's a rare Black Rift or something that spawns harder enemies or something; just to make Rifts feel more like a weather event than a "is it light or dark right now" check whenever Rift activity is high.

Technically, there already is such--you can find it as a story location. Otherwise...I think rifts are fine as they are, and as annoying as the bug is that causes the occasional monster to spawn in broad daylight...I honestly think that could remain as a feature. The spawns only happen near rifts, and aren't frequent at all when the bug does occur, so the end result is that days with high rift activity end up a bit more interesting since you end up needing to watch your back more carefully. 

The main issue I see with changing rifts like this though, is it ends up encouraging players to seek out the rifts, instead of avoiding them or building rift wards to stop them from opening. Rifts should be a hazard that players want to avoid, not interact with.

10 hours ago, Moony_Otter said:

Bowtorn and Shivers. I like these enemies, and I have little to say as criticism against them, except for the fact that there sometimes feels like there are situations where you have very little to combat them; specifically in caves. A Bowtorn in a large cave can shut down an area if it happens to have literally any verticality, as climbing up to a Bowtorn is just asking to be shot at, and climbing down to a Bowtorn is a massive risk in the darkness of a cave, as you don't know what other enemies could be down there. If you can get right up to them, they're a well-balanced enemy as you have to either get out of their line of sight or close the gap, but put them somewhere where their 'disadvantage state' of them running away is extremely risky and difficult to get to, and it can sometimes feel like wherever they are is essentially a no-go zone.
Shivers are in a similar state, but to a lesser degree. If you can get them in a place where you can fight them, an open and flat space to run in circles around them, then they're not bad! But, in a cave where any open level ground is a rare luxury, and fighting Shivers can really feel unfair at times. And, Vintage Story is a difficult game, but rarely is it unfair. Except with bears. And sometimes Bowtorn and Shivers.

Fighting anything in a cave can be dodgy--the best way to handle caving, aside from lighting everything up, is to equip good weapons and armor, and only venture in during periods of lower rift activity. It's also a good idea to have both melee and ranged weapon options available, regardless of your class, as it can help make situations like this more manageable.

As for situations where the enemies are simply too much handle...I think this is also fair. Player skill and equipment does affect how much can be managed at a time, but it's not out of the question that sometimes, the odds just aren't in your favor and it's best to avoid the fight and come back later during better conditions. Granted, those situations shouldn't happen too often(which they don't, in my opinion), but otherwise a decent chunk of the game's combat is just figuring out which fights are worth handling and which aren't.

6 hours ago, Bruno Willis said:

I've been in steel for a while and I'm still knapping flint axes and the occasional shovel. I don't know, I feel like there's something satisfying about taking things slow.

I was thinking about this the other day, especially after watching a short video on YouTube where someone mentioned this about games as a whole: the more you opt for efficiency, the less fun the game ends up being. That's not to say that there isn't a subsection of players who get their kicks from optimizing for peak efficiency, or that doing so is the wrong way to have fun. However, if it's fun...doesn't that mean the player should want to spend more time playing the game, and not less? Granted, the answer there isn't to add so much grind that the player is forced to spend time playing(a lot of MMOs are guilty of this), but at the same time...playing the most efficient way means that the player finishes the game in the fastest possible time.

It's kinda like going for a walk in the woods versus driving the same route; driving will let you make the trip faster and is certainly more efficient in terms of time, but you're not going to be able to enjoy all the sights, sounds, and smells that you would be able to by walking. I think it's a similar case when it comes to Vintage Story pacing. Nothing wrong with wanting to take it slow, or really push to certain tech, but the faster one reaches the end game the more likely they are to be left scratching their heads wondering "well, now what?". The current setup of Vintage Story allows the player the freedom to advance as quickly or as slowly in the game as they'd like(assuming they have the necessary skill), though there are some limits. Outside of the preset difficulties, the player can adjust many settings themselves to make specific things easier or harder, and add mods on top of that for what the vanilla game doesn't cover.

For myself, I can easily achieve a full set of copper tools within the first few in-game days, and bronze a couple of days after that. I like to rush iron and usually have it by the middle/end of summer, at which point I start slowing down my pace. The main reason I rush iron is I like the durability and effectiveness of the tools; it's not as good as steel, but it lets me get a lot of my more creative works done without burning through a ton of lower quality tools. I will still use flint tools on occasion though, as flint knives are handy in a pinch and flint axes are handy for spiltting firewood.

In other words, I would say that Vintage Story is definitely a slower-paced game, and meant to be completed over the course of several game sessions rather than just a game you complete over the weekend.

5 hours ago, Lollard said:

Also so much content is locked behind holding sprint + W for 4 hours to reach a different climate zone. It's cool that the world feels big but this is ridiculous for gameplay. It's remedy-able through custom world settings but most players won't know to do that and by the time they realize they can, they'll already have invested too much time on the sub-optimal world to scrap it.

As you've already noted, players can adjust themselves in the world settings simply by either enabling patchwork biomes, or shortening the polar-equator distance in the event they want to keep realistic climate distribution.

Now as to what makes a world "sub-optimal"...that depends heavily on individual preference. Players who want to get everything with only a day's travel will probably find the default generation lacking. Players who prefer a world that feels properly expansive probably won't be satisfied with generation that allows them to get anything with only a day's travel. Personally, I prefer the current default, and don't like worlds where it's possible to go from temperate to the tropics in only a couple days travel--the world feels way too small at that point.

[Thorfinn]

IMO, if you are caving on a calm or low day, and you get chased out by critters, you need to pick up the pace. Dilly-dallying around will get you killed. There's no point to exploring every nook and cranny -- they are procedurally generated, so you might as well leave and roll your RNG in a cave that isn't filled with critters. This time, not dawdling. If you find ores you want to mine, sure, wall yourself off and go to town, but realize that most likely, you are also going to have to tunnel to the surface, because they will spawn right outside your walls.

Don't bears roar? No, not all the time, at least I don't think they do, but often enough.

I have not looked at the tutorial in ages. Doesn't it do copper nuggets? Or is that something you have to pick up in the handbook?

[Echo Weaver]

I always read criticism threads and come away perplexed. I'm so fascinated by the stone age play that I have a game right now where I am not allowing myself to pursue copper until after the first winter. The heavily constrained survival play really interests me.

Then again, I see the must-have mods from long-term forum denizens and am often just as baffled.

There are clearly a LOT of ways to play the game. It's impressively versatile. 

[Veronica Hohenheim]

1 minute ago, Echo Weaver said:

I always read criticism threads and come away perplexed. I'm so fascinated by the stone age play that I have a game right now where I am not allowing myself to pursue copper until after the first winter. The heavily constrained survival play really interests me.

Then again, I see the must-have mods from long-term forum denizens and am often just as baffled.

There are clearly a LOT of ways to play the game. It's impressively versatile. 

Thats sounds like a nightmare.My biggest issue with low tier equipment is they brake super easily and it is realy annoying.If their durability was like irl (I assume) much much higher then I wouldnt have rushed and got into iron before my first winter in my first ever playtrough.Even iron ones breake super fast.I made a outside charcoal pit 5x5x5 and it ate away my iron axes like candy to fill it up.

[LadyWYT]

41 minutes ago, Thorfinn said:

Don't bears roar? No, not all the time, at least I don't think they do, but often enough.

They only roar when attacking. Otherwise, they can make a low grunt-growl sound, but it's not often, and not easy to notice at all. Granted, I don't think bears roar or snarl a lot IRL unless they're agitated, but from a gameplay standpoint having the occasional loud growl to telegraph their presence would help the player notice and avoid them.

 

4 minutes ago, Veronica Hohenheim said:

My biggest issue with low tier equipment is they brake super easily and it is realy annoying.If their durability was like irl (I assume) much much higher then I wouldnt have rushed and got into iron before my first winter in my first ever playtrough.Even iron ones breake super fast.

There is a game rule that governs how long tools last and I think it's one that can be changed at any time(you will need to reload the world if you do), though I'm not sure of the command. The main reason they break so fast though is to help push the player to progress to metal tools. Stone tools are absurdly cheap, which makes them very easy/convenient to acquire. If they had durability that was more on par with metal tools, the player wouldn't have as much reason to move away from stone tools for most tasks, and metal tools themselves wouldn't really feel like as much of an upgrade when the player does get them. As it stands, metal tools improve greatly on work speed and durability, so even low-tier copper tools feel like a big improvement over stone. 

[Echo Weaver]

9 minutes ago, Veronica Hohenheim said:

Thats sounds like a nightmare.My biggest issue with low tier equipment is they brake super easily and it is realy annoying.If their durability was like irl (I assume) much much higher then I wouldnt have rushed and got into iron before my first winter in my first ever playtrough.Even iron ones breake super fast.I made a outside charcoal pit 5x5x5 and it ate away my iron axes like candy to fill it up.

I carry around a stack of flint and make new tools as the old ones break. It's not the reason I like the stone age, but it doesn't bug me.

I do have some mods to make stuff craftable in the Stone Age that should be. You can't feed domesticated animals without feeding troughs, for example. Gating animal husbandry behind metal is kind of absurd. 

I can't make chests, so when I upgrade from reed chests, I use storage vessels. They take up more space, but that seems reasonable. 

I'm exploring the surface, looting ruins, getting my farm started, tracking and capturing livestock. I mark copper when I find it, so it should be quick when the restriction is lifted. 

[Veronica Hohenheim]

4 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

They only roar when attacking. Otherwise, they can make a low grunt-growl sound, but it's not often, and not easy to notice at all. Granted, I don't think bears roar or snarl a lot IRL unless they're agitated, but from a gameplay standpoint having the occasional loud growl to telegraph their presence would help the player notice and avoid them.

 

There is a game rule that governs how long tools last and I think it's one that can be changed at any time(you will need to reload the world if you do), though I'm not sure of the command. The main reason they break so fast though is to help push the player to progress to metal tools. Stone tools are absurdly cheap, which makes them very easy/convenient to acquire. If they had durability that was more on par with metal tools, the player wouldn't have as much reason to move away from stone tools for most tasks, and metal tools themselves wouldn't really feel like as much of an upgrade when the player does get them. As it stands, metal tools improve greatly on work speed and durability, so even low-tier copper tools feel like a big improvement over stone. 

I think they should have been only stronger and faster not a super big gap of durability.Its a game and game needs balancing and fun so there has to be decisions that arent seems make sense on a individual case I am not arguing against that.Still it feels pushy,more pushy then I would like tbh.And for the durability change,there is a setting without command but its upto 200 percent I think.A slider already exists and devs are saying they support different playstyles so I think that slider can get a tuning.And if they worry so much abt the balance they can just add warnings abt how that decision will effect the game and they sort of do that already too but not in detail.

[Zane Mordien]

15 hours ago, Moony_Otter said:

Bears. I think bears are a bit overpowered for the game they're in;

Well Tyron has stated in interviews they will change one day if that makes you feel better. He wants to make all animals have more natural reactions. I think they are too much, but they don't bother me too bad anymore. I just carry around a full inventory of flint spears and blast them (see profile picture). Flint spears are disposable, so its no big deal if I leave some behind. 

 

15 hours ago, Moony_Otter said:

Starting Copper. In early copper age-- before you obtain and crush your first copper ores-- the grind is extremely tedious and unfun.

I've played this game for too many hours and I typically just pan for most of my copper. I find maybe 10 pieces of the 40 I need from surface deposits and then I get the rest from panning. I can see how that isn't fun for most poeple, but I just watch TV while I'm doing it and its fine. 

[Bruno Willis]

9 hours ago, Lollard said:

Also so much content is locked behind holding sprint + W for 4 hours to reach a different climate zone. It's cool that the world feels big but this is ridiculous for gameplay.

I sort of feel this one, but not because it feels like the distances are too far between things. Distances are not meaningful yet. 

• summary: we could do with NPCs and Ruins which try to distract or lead astray, and the world generation could do with some thought on a larger scale: long distances traveled = big geology needed. Also, I love the game as is. I don't need these changes, I just want them cause I think they'd improve travel.

At the moment you need to prepare for a long journey, you need an elk, sailing ship, or both, and plenty of travel food. You need gear, spare cooking pots, etc, and you need to lock up your home during the most productive growing times: this is great. It feels like I'm going on a trip. Then I travel, and travel, and travel in a relatively straight line, avoiding obstacles. The generation is gorgeous, but it is procedurally generated so it does get old. I'll eventually get to my goal, somewhat depleted, and then probably go one step further and squeeze my resources. That part also feels great. But think about travel in stories: the walking walking walking is almost entirely skipped (except in LOTR), and what shows through are the moments when you interact with challenges/characters along the way. I think ruins do a good job of offering a minor distraction, traders too, but nothing bar story events feels like the sort of distraction to really derail or alter your journey. 

I am sure that as the game nears completion this is something which will become easier to fix by adding lying traders who send you to death-trap ruins or tell you you are going the wrong way, by adding tempting offers from other traders to significant but not story location ruins - distracting you, tempting you away from your goal. That sort of thing feels like something they will do when the core gameplay and story is closer to finished, and I think it would help make the travel story feel more meaningful.

The other thing to do would be to give world generation more broad-strokes intention. The nitty gritty land feels good to me, and on the medium scale I really like the sorts of hills and valleys, and swamp-land and the way they blend into each other: traveling on a medium scale lets me make/learn a story about how the land was shaped. But on a continents scale, not so much. I think it would be good to use something during world gen that essentially gouges great chasms in long (continent long) lines, and does the same with mountains - draws these long lines across the map. The lines would be able to intersect, and would become the raised center of larger land-masses or the deepest points in larger oceans. Making the grand scale generation more intentional would mean there is more story to uncover as you travel long distance. It's a geological story, but it's one that actually feels really meaningful: Imagine traveling for two days, and you've noticed you're going up, gradually, the whole time. That moment when you hit the other side and look out over new land would feel so much more significant. It'd also help us generate more maps with real continents and oceans. 

Rivers would be part of this, I think, and I think they would need to be integrated into the world gen far better than the mods do. (river tunnels? Blurg!) Rivers seem like something that will give much more story to long-distance travel. Following the river most of the way? Very cool. Trying to cross the river, but you're in mountainous terrain and it's a steep gorge? Very challenging. When rivers come it'll make these long travel times feel more interesting. 

I also think that with grander scale generation tools the devs could add some grander scale ruins generation: fortified passes through mountains which are now ruined, old bridges over rivers, collapsed or not, Tunnels into (and maybe through) mountain ranges. Ruined roads crossing plains, maybe going in a helpful direction. That's what would make long-distance travel really shine for me. I would love to be approaching a mountain range (still half a day away) and see a tunnel into the earth, which looks like it goes straight. What a choice! If the tunnel is intact, I save so much time... The same with a bridge or a pass. These'd also be small tips which any trader could offer freely or for a small cost, which would make me genuinely grateful to the trader. I'd feel like they'd traveled the land, and were actively helping me on my long journey. So essentially, ruins which are a treasure just because they make long-distance travel easier, and large scale generation which makes large scale challenges.

[LadyWYT]

3 minutes ago, Bruno Willis said:

summary: we could do with NPCs and Ruins which try to distract or lead astray, and the world generation could do with some thought on a larger scale: long distances traveled = big geology needed. Also, I love the game as is. I don't need these changes, I just want them cause I think they'd improve travel.

Traders and ruins can already distract, however, usually when the player goes on an expedition, they'll be focused on achieving a particular goal and thus trying to save space for particular loot. Traders are already slated for an overhaul, but as they stand now...they're common enough that it's not really worth going out of your way to check a trader that is miles from anywhere you'd expect to venture regularly. If traders were a lot more rare, then it might be more worthwhile to check them out when you do find them.

Ruins are the better distraction here overall, in my opinion. Obviously, ruins can't be too grandiose(performance) or lucrative(game balance), but having the occasional large ruin with a simple puzzle the player can solve for some more interesting loot than normal(noble attire, decorated storage vessels, valuable gems to trade, etc) would definitely entice players to allow themselves to get distracted. Of course, the player can always mark the location and make another trip later to check it out.

10 minutes ago, Bruno Willis said:

But think about travel in stories: the walking walking walking is almost entirely skipped (except in LOTR), and what shows through are the moments when you interact with challenges/characters along the way

Yes and no--it depends on the medium. For movies, most of the boring bits like walking are condensed to montages, or cut entirely. With books, there's also a lot of boring content cut(like potty breaks), because it adds nothing to the story and the reader can just reasonably assume that certain things happened to advance the adventure, without actually having to read about it. Otherwise, there is plenty of "boring" content like travel, that ends up being interesting because the story focuses on the character interactions that take place during that time, and not just the travel itself. 

For the videogame context, longer travel times can help the world feel authentically large. To use Skyrim as an example: Skyrim is supposed to be a vast, untamed wilderness in lore, but in actual implementation it ends up feeling small given that the player can easily get from one settlement to another with a few minutes' jog. In contrast, Vintage Story sets up a world that is mostly wilderness with very few surviving human settlements, and the premise feels believable given that the player has to actually sink time and effort into getting from point A to point B.

19 minutes ago, Bruno Willis said:

I am sure that as the game nears completion this is something which will become easier to fix by adding lying traders who send you to death-trap ruins or tell you you are going the wrong way, by adding tempting offers from other traders to significant but not story location ruins - distracting you, tempting you away from your goal. That sort of thing feels like something they will do when the core gameplay and story is closer to finished, and I think it would help make the travel story feel more meaningful.

That is so mean...but I like the idea. Ironically, this was a feature of Morrowind--some NPCs would lie to the player. While it's certainly an immersive quality, it can also be fairly frustrating at times, so it's a tricky mechanic to implement well.

 

21 minutes ago, Bruno Willis said:

The other thing to do would be to give world generation more broad-strokes intention. The nitty gritty land feels good to me, and on the medium scale I really like the sorts of hills and valleys, and swamp-land and the way they blend into each other: traveling on a medium scale lets me make/learn a story about how the land was shaped. But on a continents scale, not so much. I think it would be good to use something during world gen that essentially gouges great chasms in long (continent long) lines, and does the same with mountains - draws these long lines across the map. The lines would be able to intersect, and would become the raised center of larger land-masses or the deepest points in larger oceans. Making the grand scale generation more intentional would mean there is more story to uncover as you travel long distance. It's a geological story, but it's one that actually feels really meaningful: Imagine traveling for two days, and you've noticed you're going up, gradually, the whole time. That moment when you hit the other side and look out over new land would feel so much more significant. It'd also help us generate more maps with real continents and oceans. 

The main issue I see with generation on a scale like this, is that it's hard to properly appreciate without a very high render distance. 

 

25 minutes ago, Bruno Willis said:

Rivers would be part of this, I think, and I think they would need to be integrated into the world gen far better than the mods do. (river tunnels? Blurg!) Rivers seem like something that will give much more story to long-distance travel. Following the river most of the way? Very cool. Trying to cross the river, but you're in mountainous terrain and it's a steep gorge? Very challenging. When rivers come it'll make these long travel times feel more interesting. 

Honestly, if one wanted to be ultra-realistic with rivers, they should require a raft or boat to cross, or else one must find a spot that can be forded. I don't know how you'd simulate such a thing properly though. 

 

27 minutes ago, Bruno Willis said:

I also think that with grander scale generation tools the devs could add some grander scale ruins generation

Better Ruins already adds ruins on a grandiose scale--it's also a mod that's notorious for being hard on performance as a result. It's not that grander landscapes and ruins wouldn't be interesting, but the bigger and more detailed things get the more the hardware requirements go up. The game needs to provide the same general gameplay experience for players across a variety of hardware; that's not to say one should expect it to run on a potato, but players on lower-end hardware shouldn't be left holding the bag, so to speak.

[Bruno Willis]

1 hour ago, LadyWYT said:

Better Ruins already adds ruins on a grandiose scale--it's also a mod that's notorious for being hard on performance as a result. It's not that grander landscapes and ruins wouldn't be interesting, but the bigger and more detailed things get the more the hardware requirements go up. The game needs to provide the same general gameplay experience for players across a variety of hardware; that's not to say one should expect it to run on a potato, but players on lower-end hardware shouldn't be left holding the bag, so to speak.

These are really not what I'm thinking about - those are ruins which are a reward for the same reason that vanilla ruins are a reward, just amped up. I think ruins which facilitate or complicate long distance travel would really aid the game. They don't have to be grandiose or complex at all, just intended to impact long travel. Imagine running into a long wall - just that - and you'll either need to cut through it, ramp over it, or find the gatehouse. It gives your travel a little more meaning. Same with bridges, tunnels, etc. This'd go even harder if it were long, serious mountain ranges with passes through them. Finding the pass would feel amazing, you'd note it on your map, and it would end up being a key travel feature. 

[LadyWYT]

Just now, Bruno Willis said:

These are really not what I'm thinking about - those are ruins which are a reward for the same reason that vanilla ruins are a reward, just amped up. I think ruins which facilitate or complicate long distance travel would really aid the game. They don't have to be grandiose or complex at all, just intended to impact long travel. Imagine running into a long wall - just that - and you'll either need to cut through it, ramp over it, or find the gatehouse. It gives your travel a little more meaning. Same with bridges, tunnels, etc. This'd go even harder if it were long, serious mountain ranges with passes through them. Finding the pass would feel amazing, you'd note it on your map, and it would end up being a key travel feature. 

Ah okay. Interesting... I'm not sure I've seen the idea quite laid out like that. I think the mountain ranges would be a little easier to implement than the ruins. It'd almost certainly have mixed reactions, given some of the initial complaints about terrain navigation when 1.20 launched, but needing to find a pass through the mountains or else go around seems like it would be interesting, especially if the passes have the potential to be snowed under during certain times of year. Aside from travel, it could also be something that affects the local climate, in that you could have one type of biome on one side of the range, and something else entirely on the other side. 

I'm also assuming that mountain ranges would be easier to place seamlessly into the landscape, since man-made structures tend to stick out. Though on the ruins note...shipwrecks. There's plenty to see and do while traveling over land, but sailing over the water can be tedious. However, imagine just bumming along in your sailboat, wondering when you'll ever find the opposite shore, and suddenly noticing that the funny-looking lump of coral in the reef you're sailing over isn't a rock. If I'm recalling correctly, the lore suggests that some of the Hanseatic League used ships to avoid the Rot, so maybe some of those ships sank and are just loaded with all sorts of valuable trading goods. Of course, the player has to figure out how to retrieve such treasure, before it can be of any use. It's also a good excuse to add potentially dangerous aquatic life such as sharks or squid(Humboldt squid are particularly nasty, as I understand it), or an aquatic monster like a diving bell that may or may not actually be hanging around points of interest like this.

[Bruno Willis]

1 hour ago, LadyWYT said:

For the videogame context, longer travel times can help the world feel authentically large. To use Skyrim as an example: Skyrim is supposed to be a vast, untamed wilderness in lore, but in actual implementation it ends up feeling small given that the player can easily get from one settlement to another with a few minutes' jog. In contrast, Vintage Story sets up a world that is mostly wilderness with very few surviving human settlements, and the premise feels believable given that the player has to actually sink time and effort into getting from point A to point B.

Yeah, this is really true. Vintage story successfully makes me feel like I'm alone in the wilderness, only occasionally coming across other people. It's just that the landscape generation, while really strong on a small scale, doesn't offer that larger 'narrative' or geological logic quite as well. That means you end up seeing combinations of forest, hills, gullies, deserts and mountains - all really good - over and over again without a sense that there's a bigger 'geological story' behind them. 

4 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

There's plenty to see and do while traveling over land, but sailing over the water can be tedious. However, imagine just bumming along in your sailboat, wondering when you'll ever find the opposite shore, and suddenly noticing that the funny-looking lump of coral in the reef you're sailing over isn't a rock. If I'm recalling correctly, the lore suggests that some of the Hanseatic League used ships to avoid the Rot, so maybe some of those ships sank and are just loaded with all sorts of valuable trading goods. Of course, the player has to figure out how to retrieve such treasure, before it can be of any use.

Yeah, I really like this idea. I'd also love to see hulks still floating, all rotted and overgrown, and crawling with drifters. There's something incredibly spooky about ghost ships. You'd want them to have a way to sink if they were holed too much by the player, and they'd creak and moan all the time, and maybe have pumps which could be powered to drain lower decks.

It'd also be nice if some of the traders were ocean going, pulled up on the side of an island in their houseboats (I'm pleased to hear that traders will get re-worked). I feel like the oceans will get a lot more love now that we've got a way to explore them. 

[LadyWYT]

24 minutes ago, Bruno Willis said:

There's something incredibly spooky about ghost ships. You'd want them to have a way to sink if they were holed too much by the player, and they'd creak and moan all the time, and maybe have pumps which could be powered to drain lower decks.

Or I mean...ghost ship could have a very different meaning in Vintage Story, assuming some past genius thought it was a good idea to make a large seafaring automaton for transport. Imagine seeing a rusted out hunk of junk floating around the ocean and assuming it's just an old abandoned vessel...and then figuring out that it's actively hunting you!

 

24 minutes ago, Bruno Willis said:

It's just that the landscape generation, while really strong on a small scale, doesn't offer that larger 'narrative' or geological logic quite as well. That means you end up seeing combinations of forest, hills, gullies, deserts and mountains - all really good - over and over again without a sense that there's a bigger 'geological story' behind them. 

In this case, I wonder if it's feasible to designate a special selection of "natural wonders" for landscape generation, and have them generate very rarely. Stuff like Grand Canyon, Great Plains, Uluru/Ayer's Rock, petrified forest, etc. Doesn't need to look like the real world thing, just needs to be something that stands out. We kinda have some things like this in the game, like those epic overhangs, glow worm caves, and special big trees that only occur at world generation, but this is just taking it a bit further, it sounds like.

Edited September 28, 2025 by LadyWYT
grammar

[Bruno Willis]

26 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

Or I mean...ghost ship could have a very different meaning in Vintage Story, assuming some past genius thought it was a good idea to make a large seafaring automaton for transport. Imagine seeing a rusted out hunk of junk floating around the ocean and assuming it's just an old abandoned vessel...and then figuring out that it's actively hunting you!

Yes! What a horrible idea.

26 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

In this case, I wonder if it's feasible to designate a special selection of "natural wonders" for landscape generation, and have then generate very rarely. Stuff like Grand Canyon, Great Plains, Uluru/Ayer's Rock, petrified forest, etc. Doesn't need to look like the real world thing, just needs to be something that stands out. We kinda have some things like this in the game, like those epic overhangs, glow worm caves, and special big trees that only occur at world generation, but this is just taking it a bit further, it sounds like.

This is great, and it'd add so much interest to travel. I love finding those big trees and using them as travel markers. I wonder if these world wonders could be tied into world generation in more than just being placed in afterwards - like if a giant tree gets placed down, the area all around it would automatically generate as forest. If an Uluru-like generated, it would guarantee big flat desert all around it. If a mountain pass generated, it'd guarantee a mountain chain to either side? 

I was thinking even broader, something right at world generation which says "there's a bulge on this part of the planet, and there's a deep bowl here," and then it does the usual generation over top of that. If you wanted two large land masses, you'd scale it low, and the world would generate with two huge bulges which become the high points of two different continents, and two deep bowls which would be guaranteed big oceans. If you wanted something like the current world gen, you'd scale it high and there'd be more bulges and bowls squashing up together and they'd sort of average out a bit. I don't know how flexible that part of the code is now though, probably not very. 

Edited September 28, 2025 by Bruno Willis
Wanted to add mountain passes

[HalfAxd]

Some of the things I do...

Bears:  I am not some elite gamer, I just learn how to avoid death to bears.   Stay out of the forests...  burn large sections of forest to clear the way if you have to.  Bear pits are your friend... easy to make and they work on wolves too.

Climbing: Agreed, but for now I use the StepUp mod as a stop gap.  Not really what you're after but it helps.

Starting copper:  Spawns can suck... I get it... to help in bad situations, use the mod to zoom your view to help spy surface copper.  Burn the plains to clear lines of sight to zoom in on copper from a tall vantage point.  If all else fails, restart.  I do if it is really that bad.

Bowtorn and Shivers: In caves I bring a stack of dirt and quickly build 2 stack high walls if there are bowtorn around.  Helps, but yes.. they are a pain...  you can run away from the cave 30 blocks or so and return after they de-spawn...  cheesy... I don't do this too often but I do have my moods.  ha!    

May your crocks always be full