Temporal gear/drifter question

[Wafflekitty2]

Hey guys, so I played before and just got back into it and it's been a few months. The first time I played the drifters were much taller and look as they do on the wiki, now however they're short and almost impish and drop NOTHING. atleast the ones I've killed. I'm really trying to set a new spawn point and am having a hard time finding any information on this. I know I need a temporal gear but I was wondering if the small drifters ever drop them or if big drifters come out at some point. 

 

Thank you for reading!

[redram]

All drifters drop temporal gears, though the stronger (deeper) variants drop them more often.  Surface drifters I think the rate is like 1 in 35 or something.  So it can take awhile to get one.   They should also drop flax occaisionally.  But the majority do drop nothing, it's true.

[Sparkle Kitti]

On 4/7/2020 at 6:14 PM, redram said:

I think the rate is like 1 in 35 or something

I believe it's around 1 in 100. So it takes a while

[Streetwind]

I recommend making a few tool racks on the outside of your home, and filling them with stone spears. At night, empty out your hotbar and fill it with spears plus a torch in the offhand, then go hunting.

Four thrown stone spears will reliably kill a surface drifter without letting them get close enough to hurt you. It is also fast enough in inflicting that damage to keep the drifters from fleeing while injured, which is a problem with regular melee attacks or bow shots since it is very dark at night and you can easily lose them (or get pounced by other unseen enemies as you pursue).

It helps that you can throw from relatively close up as they walk towards you, meaning you don't have to be a crackshot to pull this off. But one word of advice: you can begin charging the throw while walking backwards to maintain distance, but the crosshair won't shrink fully while you're in motion. For a split second, just before you release, you'll want to stop moving and make sure your accuracy is dead on. With a little practice, this will come naturally. Walk, charge, stop, release, new spear automatically pops into your hand, walk, charge, stop, release... Four shots in four seconds, one dead drifter. Pick up your spears, rinse, repeat.

Come morning you should have plenty of corpses to dissect, and you'll have your temporal gear within a few nights.

[ApacheTech]

Temporal gears can also be dropped via panning. I've only got one in four stacks of shale sand, but it's an option. The drops from panning are far better than the drops from skinning the same number of drifters.