LadyWYT

Half the ones I butcher have fat, or so it seems to me. The bushmeat is just convenient protein, or turns into rot with the hides I don't need. Plus if you can manage to kill off the wolves, you don't need to worry about them until they respawn--hence why some might go to the effort of hunting them down instead of avoiding them. True, and a decent strategy, but I'd also say it hinges on preferred playstyle and player skill. More cautious players will probably choose to avoid the deep woods, while more brazen ones might not care or even deliberately seek out dangerous wildlife. The same logic applies to early armor and shields--some prefer the added protection, while others would prefer not to spend the resources or deal with the hunger penalties. Likewise, some strategies might be "better" than others, but also be a lot riskier and require a higher level of player skill in order to use successfully. At the end of the day though, I'd say the best strategy is whichever one keeps you alive.

That's strange...I've not had any issues using the red clay for clayforming, either in that version or the versions after.

Gotcha. There could potentially be clipping issues, but it still sounds more like it's just an equipment factor. The crude shield will slow things down, but otherwise isn't very good at really stopping attacks(aside from rocks thrown by drifters). It'll give you a better chance to stay alive when attacked, but you'll almost certainly be injured in the process. My general approach to wolves and other hostile wildlife is to avoid them when I can, and otherwise attack them at range, one at a time, when I have to deal with them. Early in the game, the shield and improvised armor are my last resorts, and if there's more than one hostile animal the chances of survival are slim. The only other thing I can think of that may be happening here(as far as I'm aware, anyway), is that when you get hit by something, the game randomly decides which slot you take damage: head, body, or legs. If you don't have armor in the slot that it chooses, then you'll take the full damage from the attack. According to the wiki, the crude shield only has a 90% active block protection, so it's still possible for an attack or two to end up getting around the shield and hit you in one of the other slots.

You can generate the story structures, yes, if they don't already exist in your world. I think you can also regenerate the story structures that are already there as well, as I seem to recall someone doing so with the Resonance Archive for their server. I'm not sure that you can generate other structures, or regenerate entire chunks though.

I've been playing the current 1.20 iteration and not run into any major hiccups or glitches, barring one time I had the world crash in a certain area(which worked fine after reloading the world, no further issues). So I would say it plays fine, but of course it's always best to wait for the stable release if you're intending to play on older worlds, or otherwise intend to sink a lot of time into a new world. As for when it'll release...as @Thorfinn already said: when it's ready. Given that the current version is a release candidate, that generally means that all the major pieces are in place, and the only things left are bug fixes and minor tweaks. In the case of 1.20, there are a few minor bits that still need polishing on the new lore stuff, but most everything that is supposed to be there is there. My guess would be we might see a stable release sometime after New Year's.

I don't know if it tells you where it spawns them, but assuming you have to run the command for each separate location...oh yeah, it's going to spoil some major plot points if you do that in 1.20. For those who don't really don't want spoilers, I would recommend either starting a fresh world to ensure the new stuff generates without commands, OR if you have a friend/family member handy(that you trust to do this) get them to run the command in your world instead. And like @Divočák mentioned, if you're willing to figure out WorldEdit, you can copy your base over to a new world and have the best of both options, as it were.

I like them. They're adorably goofy, and which one I pick depends on the character I want to play. I don't think there's a lore reason for why the voices are portrayed by instruments, though there IS a lore reason for why there's very different melodies for certain characters, let's say. As for why instruments...I presume it's just a style choice, similar to the one made in Don't Starve. It also leaves a lot more room to use one's imagination to fill in details on the characters too. If I had to change anything though, I'd probably tune the sounds just a bit so they don't sound so...flat. But then again, I don't know that much about music, so I don't know if that accurately describes what I'm thinking of or not. Otherwise I'd just add a few more instrument options, like maybe a cello or violin.

Tagging on to what @Thorfinn said, you can also enable sleeping through storms, if you don't want to disable temporal mechanics entirely. Then you can choose whether or not you want to skip the storm, or go hunting monsters for gears and Jonas parts.

That was Thorfinn, actually I meant that the stable 1.20 release shouldn't be too far away, since "release candidate" usually means cleaning up residual bugs and very minor tweaks, nothing more. So I'd expect to see it sometime after New Year's. You are correct though, in that the full game isn't expected to be finished for several years.

Welcome to the forums! For pottery/brick colors, I believe it may take certain types as clay, as well as firing in a beehive kiln. Pit kilns are limited in the colors they can produce. As for patterned bricks...no clue. I've only just started scratching the surface on new building materials. I suppose it's possible a few things could be creative mode only, but I'm more inclined to suspect that perhaps not all recipes have been implemented in this build yet. The release candidate contains most all the content that it's supposed to have, but there's still a few things to be properly finished before it launches. Wish I had a better answer. I'll have to pay closer attention the next time I'm playing.

There's already a lead system in the works with the rope, I think. I want to say you can lead a tamed elk around with a rope in the latest update, but I'm not entirely sure as that's one thing I've not yet tried. If I recall correctly though, the ropes are still a little janky, hence the current lack of leads.

Which shield is it? It occurred to me that I forgot to mention damage tiers earlier. Wolves have tier 2 damage, which if I recall correctly, means that you'll need tier 2 armor/shield to really make their attacks trivial. Lower tier equipment is still better than nothing, but won't be nearly as effective against higher tier enemies.

One thing I will note about the elk--while enemies don't seem to target the elk, I would recommend making a stable or holding pen to park it in when you're at home. The elk does stay in one spot, generally, but if you have a trough of food somewhere nearby it will notice and make a beeline for it. Also speaking of bears and fences...they can swat things through fences, if the target is standing close enough. One of my sheep got mauled by a bear yesterday, which was disappointing. Looks like I'll be building a fortified perimeter, which is ideal anyway given there's a cave nearby that will produce a monster or two every now and then. Edit: I correct myself--the elk will wander a bit when unmounted. So definitely a good idea to build a pen or stable to keep it in whenever you're not currently out on an adventure.

Summoning @ifoz for expert opinion! In my experience, I've not found anything particularly noteworthy about those ruins other than they're just a landmark, but then again, I've not gone trying to dig them up either. You could switch your gamemode to spectator for a moment and poke around to see if there's any loot to be found. If there is, then you can switch back to survival and go digging, but if not, then you can switch back to survival and continue playing as normal. Just make sure that you aren't clipped into the terrain or hovering too far above the ground when you switch back to survival mode; wouldn't do to awkwardly go splat.

You need to be actively blocking and facing the enemy head-on to get the most out of your shield. The effectiveness also depends on what kind of shield you're using; better quality shields will block more incoming damage and last longer. I'll also note that it helps to wear armor when using a shield as well, as that will further mitigate any damage that wasn't blocked by the shield. I'm assuming though that you're referring to the crude shield for early game defense against hostile wildlife. In this case, the same logic applies as above--you want to be facing the attacker and actively blocking in order to get the most out of the shield. It's certainly not going to soak up all the damage, but the idea is that it mitigates enough to allow you to survive the encounter. Pair with improvised armor to increase your survival chances a little more. I will also note though that the tradeoff to using a shield is that it will increase your hunger rate, and remove your off-hand slot as an option for holding a light source. In the later stages of the game, neither one is a particularly big deal, but early on the hunger penalty can pose issues if you have problems securing food sources.

Can confirm that the features listed in the trailer are available in the release candidate. Can also confirm that I've played through the main portion of the story. The only real rough spot I've noticed so far is that a few of the minor fluff bits are missing from the new lore/story stuff, but the main portion is playable to the end. I'll definitely need to give it another run through, as I'm fairly certain there are at least two different ways to complete it, and I would also expect a couple of pieces to be fine-tuned a bit more as they felt just a bit off. In any case though, I'm guessing that the friends were upset because they were expecting the stable release, and not the release candidate. Which, since we have a release candidate, I would expect the stable release soon, although perhaps not until after New Year's. We'll see. In the meantime though, despite the release candidate technically being an unstable version, I don't expect to see anything aside from bug fixes and a few minor tweaks, so I'm guessing that worlds created in that version will carry over to the stable release.

I did see a note on the wiki that indicated antlers will shed after full growth, and can be picked up by the player. I don't recall that being a thing when 1.19 originally launched, so I'm also wondering if that's what might have changed in one of the patches. IE, players are supposed to find shed antlers to display, as a nifty little treasure item, instead of getting a pair of antlers every time they shoot a male deer(which is honestly pretty easy). Either way I just want my antlers to decorate with. I could just cheat some in, of course, but it's a lot more fun to hunt them down...plus I typically need the meat anyway.

Personally the delay in pixel shaping doesn't bother me, and I'm a twitchy player a good chunk of the time. To me the delay is barely noticeable because it's so small, and the little bit that I might notice helps keep me focused on more precise actions instead of speeding through everything. I'm not Tyron either, but if I had to guess, it might be in place to provide a more immersive experience for the crafting. It takes time to shape pottery(speaking from experience here), same as it takes time to butcher a carcass, or pick berries, or complete any of the other tasks the game requires. Now Vintage Story could have made the completions instant, like how the other block game handles things, but it would lose its soul in doing so, I think. Not saying that everything needs to take a lot of time to complete, but one of the main vibes of Vintage Story, in my opinion, is that players are supposed to be intentional in their actions, and not just throwing things together on a whim. Having a small, definite cooldown might also make it easier to animate the actions as well.

Hmmmmm...maybe I should make a better effort to depopulate the countryside of antlered creatures and see if it just got changed to a low droprate. I know that previously, I was always getting the antlers/horns, and ended up having more sets than I knew what to do with. So it's entirely possible the droprate was changed to make them more of a trophy item.

For just the vanilla game, you can use shears on leaves to get a greater yield of sticks and tree seeds before you cut the tree down. Shears are also great for clearing brushland in order to keep things from sneaking up on you as easily.

The update is still very new, so it will take time for things to be figured out and turned into proper guides. Plus I daresay some things are left a bit vague in the official media so as to let players discover some of the things themselves. But in any case, for those wondering how to get the elk:

Very true. I don't play with gravity enabled for soil blocks, but boy did it cross my mind given how many times I nearly rode into one.

Oh, oops. I had always understood that to be the case. Then again, I was also pretty tired when I wrote that, which never really helps, but always makes reading the next morning rather interesting. Thank you for clarifying! In any case, my general experience has been that Decent or better readings are the spots to dig. The percentage value I don't really pay attention to unless I'm desperate enough to dig in a questionable spot, in which case I'll use the percentages to decide where I want to dig in the hopes of finding something. The only exception I can think of is in the case of halite--I've never seen a reading higher than Poor or Very Poor, but I have seen high percentages. However, I will also note that I generally opt for buying halite from traders instead of looking for it myself.

For some reason the deer aren't dropping antlers, despite it being wintertime and the males having obvious home decorations on their heads. Did the drop rate get changed, is it bugged, or did I just manage to break something when I last messed with mods back in 1.19? I'm not playing with any mods since updating to the pre-release. I know I was using the deer mod from Fauna of the Stone Age back on 1.19, and that was known to overwrite the vanilla deer and cause them to not drop antlers. However, I would have thought that disabling the mods and installing the pre-release would have overwritten any files that were affected by mods. Essentially I'm wondering if anyone else has had issues with it or has better ideas of a fix, before I go backing up my worlds and doing a complete reinstall.

Not to my knowledge. I pretty much just eat whenever I'm hungry and can finish the whole meal in one sitting, or if I'm fixing to head out to go do something and not bringing food with me. Of course, since I tend to sleep through the nights, I also make sure I'm not going to go hungry while I'm asleep either. Not that it would kill me, but it's not the best thing to wake up to. During the shorter winter days I was clocking around 7k per day, probably about 10k if I rode all day and night. It does depend a lot on which route you take as well; if there's a stretch of flatter land that skirts a mountain, it's often faster to go that way than taking the most direct path. I also don't really recommend riding at night if you don't have to. While it's easy enough to outrun things on the elk, you're not going to be able to see very far even with the lantern, so you have a much greater chance of riding into a hole. As for how to get the elk: