First impressions (80 hours)

[regex]

Firstly, I am very much enjoying this game, it has a great TFC vibe and the progression is genuinely fun. I'm looking forward to getting more into the story but I'm still grappling with the base mechanics 80~ hours into my first Standard playthrough. 

That being said...

I can't move my farmland to a better layout, I had to use creative mode to respawn the blocks. Sure, there's something to be said about "cheating" there if the exploit is to break/replace and get all the nutrients back but why not just preserve the block data? Because the blocks won't stack? Sounds like a good compromise to me.

The temporal storms are boring gameplay. I died three or four times to them, all times trying to get home before I learned I could reset my spawn to my cellar, the only seemingly safe space in my well-lit tower house. Now I just dig a hole or hide in the cellar to wait them out because I can't actually get anything done while they're going on. I even get spawns in my cellar if I don't stand in the right place; it's a 7 x 7 room with a lantern in the middle.

There's something to be said about the acid-tripness of the render-distance fog during a storm but otherwise I'm completely over them. I'm assuming I will need to venture into the temporal storms at some point to farm a certain mob, which is why I haven't simply shut them off.

Also kind of disappointed that I can't use gearing on windmill power trains to spin a quern faster. I was checking out possible windmill setups in a creative world, glad I did that first before wasting resources in the actual survival world.

Do trees grow bigger over time or do they stay as spawned?

Yes, yes, mods exist, I'll probably look into that sort of thing once I'm done with a vanilla playthrough, make a TFC-style survival game without all the eldritch horror stuff, but I generally like to make a point to leave mods out until I've experienced the base game to my satisfaction. There's a lot here.

Thanks for reading, here's a levitating piglet.

Edited December 18, 2025 by regex

[Slam]

1 hour ago, regex said:

Also kind of disappointed that I can't use gearing on windmill power trains to spin a quern faster. I was checking out possible windmill setups in a creative world, glad I did that first before wasting resources in the actual survival world.

I’m going to make that mistake on purpose lol.

[LadyWYT]

First off, welcome to the forums(and the game)!

1 hour ago, regex said:

I can't move my farmland to a better layout, I had to use creative mode to respawn the blocks. Sure, there's something to be said about "cheating" there if the exploit is to break/replace and get all the nutrients back but why not just preserve the block data? Because the blocks won't stack? Sounds like a good compromise to me.

There are mods that allow you to retrieve farmland, but as for why it's not in the game, it's likely to both prevent players from cheesing farm mechanics(dig up dirt and place the same dirt back to restore full nutrients) as well as perhaps to avoid a lot of inventory clutter and potential code bloat(though I'm not sure how efficiently such could be coded, so it might be possible).

Given there is plenty of dirt in the world though, I wouldn't worry about this one too much. Eventually, you'll be wanting to replace the dirt with terra preta anyway.

1 hour ago, regex said:

The temporal storms are boring gameplay. I died three or four times to them, all times trying to get home before I learned I could reset my spawn to my cellar, the only seemingly safe space in my well-lit tower house. Now I just dig a hole or hide in the cellar to wait them out because I can't actually get anything done while they're going on. I even get spawns in my cellar if I don't stand in the right place; it's a 7 x 7 room with a lantern in the middle.

Whether or not temporal storms are fun depends on who you ask. For those who don't enjoy the mechanic, that is also why there is an option to turn them off, or sleep through them. You should be able to turn them after world creation with the command /worldconfig temporalStorms off; just make sure to reload the world after running the command in order for the change to take effect.

 

1 hour ago, regex said:

There's something to be said about the acid-tripness of the render-distance fog during a storm but otherwise I'm completely over them. I'm assuming I will need to venture into the temporal storms at some point to farm a certain mob, which is why I haven't simply shut them off.

Eh, not really. There are special monsters that only spawn during temporal storms, that have a chance to drop Jonas parts, however you can also find Jonas parts in ruins or hunt other special monsters in the deep places of the world. Temporal gears can drop from any monster, as well as be occasionally found as ruins loot or purchased from treasure hunter traders. Rusty gears can easily be found in ruins or retrieved from any monster, in addition to being acquired via trading.

In my opinion, it's easier to acquire Jonas parts and temporal gears from temporal storms, but you're not going to hamstring yourself if you choose to turn the mechanic off.

2 hours ago, regex said:

Also kind of disappointed that I can't use gearing on windmill power trains to spin a quern faster. I was checking out possible windmill setups in a creative world, glad I did that first before wasting resources in the actual survival world.

I wouldn't be surprised if this becomes a mechanical option in a later update, if it's not already a feature. In my experience, how fast a windmill can power a machine depends on what kind of machines it's trying to power at the same time, and how strong the wind currently is at the windmill's location. 

 

2 hours ago, regex said:

Do trees grow bigger over time or do they stay as spawned?

The ones spawned in the world stay as they are. The tree seeds planted by the player will turn into mature trees after a certain number of days, however, trees planted by the player will never be the old growth trees that can spawn naturally(like the huge oak trees).

Fruit trees are different though, in that they will continue to grow over time until they reach their maximum size, regardless of whether they spawned at world generation or were a cutting planted by the player.

2 hours ago, regex said:

make a TFC-style survival game without all the eldritch horror stuff, but I generally like to make a point to leave mods out until I've experienced the base game to my satisfaction.

Do keep in mind that if/when you go this route, you will definitely want a mod that allows you to reset your spawn point via bed or some other means, since you won't have access to temporal gears. I think there is a console command to change spawn, but console commands aren't the most immersive option.

[regex]

1 hour ago, LadyWYT said:

You should be able to turn them after world creation with the command /worldconfig temporalStorms off; just make sure to reload the world after running the command in order for the change to take effect.

...

In my opinion, it's easier to acquire Jonas parts and temporal gears from temporal storms, but you're not going to hamstring yourself if you choose to turn the mechanic off.

Nice, thanks for all the info!

[Zane Mordien]

7 hours ago, LadyWYT said:

Do keep in mind that if/when you go this route, you will definitely want a mod that allows you to reset your spawn point via bed or some other means, since you won't have access to temporal gears. I think there is a console command to change spawn, but console commands aren't the most immersive option.

@regex The easier option is just to go into creative mode. Open inventory and give youreself a temporal gear. 

9 hours ago, regex said:

The temporal storms are boring gameplay.

They are 100% boring after the first WTF moment. The mentioned Jonas parts are worthless unless you are just a completionist. They can make some cool stuff, but by the time you can make it, it isn't that useful anymore. I'm holding out hope that they will find a way to make them more interesting one day. 

[Maelstrom]

On 12/18/2025 at 12:57 PM, LadyWYT said:

Eventually, you'll be wanting to replace the dirt with terra preta anyway.

The benefit from terra preta is pretty small when compared to high fertility soil.  The increased nutrients do benefit crop growth speed but it won't be enough to fit another crop cycle during the summer.  Terra preta is pretty much a min/max kind of thing.

[Zane Mordien]

39 minutes ago, Maelstrom said:

The benefit from terra preta is pretty small when compared to high fertility soil.  The increased nutrients do benefit crop growth speed but it won't be enough to fit another crop cycle during the summer.  Terra preta is pretty much a min/max kind of thing.

Yeah by the time you can make terra preta,  you don't need it in base game. I don't turn my nose up if I find it but that's extremely rare.

[Maelstrom]

I agree.  I make terra preta coz well...  it's there.   Maybe I consider it something of a mini-game?  I honestly don't know why I make it.

But thinking about it, maybe a cool change to soil fertility is to adjust yield based on fertility.   If the soil maintains nutrient levels above 50% the harvest gets a bonus to its yield.  Once nutrient levels drop below 50% growth speed declines and any bonuses to crop yields are lost.

[Loosebearings]

16 hours ago, Maelstrom said:

The benefit from terra preta is pretty small when compared to high fertility soil.  The increased nutrients do benefit crop growth speed but it won't be enough to fit another crop cycle during the summer.  Terra preta is pretty much a min/max kind of thing.

It's easier to just dig up all your farmland and replace it with new medium fertility soil everytime the nutrients run out than go through the effort of using fertilizer or terra preta.

[pigfood]

On 12/18/2025 at 6:49 PM, regex said:

Also kind of disappointed that I can't use gearing on windmill power trains to spin a quern faster. I was checking out possible windmill setups in a creative world, glad I did that first before wasting resources in the actual survival world.

Huh? Gearing works, you can use large gear - small gear to speed up querns, helve hammers, pounders, .... You do need enough torque/sails.

My target number is something like >16 full vanilla sails (full sails as in the the full 5x set = 80x baby sails). With the 'Millwright' mod, you can build smaller, more compact setups.

(I'm currently growing 750 flax.)

Edited December 21, 2025 by sushieater

[Mowdan]

On 12/18/2025 at 11:49 AM, regex said:

Also kind of disappointed that I can't use gearing on windmill power trains to spin a quern faster. I was checking out possible windmill setups in a creative world, glad I did that first before wasting resources in the actual survival world.

Yeah like the other person said gearing works for sure, one full sail on max wind can do single high, but  to get good speeds you need a lot of power. I got the quern to go very fast in my test world with a double high gear. The fast cheap one is for sure a smallest sail big gear on top of a quern. the low gear lets it turn with low power but it works well enough. Remember if you are in high gear or direct it can be much slower if you do not have enough power or even stop and stall.