LadyWYT

I mean, I remember barren oceans from the other block game. No fish, no coral, no seaweed, just water. Nothing but water. Traveling them was very easy given there was no terrain or monsters to serve as obstacles, but it wasn't fun(and not just because the early boats were terrible). The aquatic update changed all that by adding seaweed, coral, plenty of fish, dolphins, shipwrecks, and the guardians/ocean temples, along with improved boats. Not only did boats become much more usable, but there was also something to see out in all that water when traveling, and goodies to look for if one is inclined to explore. Similar case with oceans and large bodies of water in Vintage Story. Once there is some actual life to the water, and a proper fishing system or some sort of curiosity to find(sunken treasure, ruins, etc), or even a way to really explore underwater...I don't expect water travel to be very exciting at all. It's simply an easy way to get from point A to point B, but without anything interesting to look at.

Welcome to the forums! To my knowledge, default world settings are getting adjusted in 1.21 to account for oceans, since there's now actually content to be had for such large bodies of water. Otherwise, I agree with what @Lugh Crow-Slave already noted--aquatic content is still lacking, and needs more refinement before too many adjustments happen. Otherwise, players will end up with a lot of water but nothing to really do with it, which isn't very fun.

Pretty much this. The temporal storms and associated monsters can be a little tedious, sure, but they're meant to be supernatural environmental disasters/hazards that you have to occasionally deal with in order to accomplish your goals. There are reasons to brave the storms(temporal gears, Jonas parts), that will likely be more attractive reasons once more late game tech is added, but otherwise monsters are not something the player is supposed to be actively hunting for goodies. If you make monster drops particularly lucrative, then they stop being hazards that could wreck your day and start being...mobile loot boxes, essentially. As for avoiding the tedium of temporal storms, there's already the option to sleep through them, or disable them entirely. Both options are disabled by default, so you'd need to either enable them at world creation, or run the appropriate command and reload the world. And as a final note on monster loot...that is one advantage of having robust mod support. There are several out there that adjust the monster loot tables, and it's also relatively easy to make a new mod if there's nothing currently in existence to do the job.

https://lophi.bandcamp.com/album/vintage-story-ost Here you go--it's a name-your-price kind of deal, but the listed suggested price is $10 USD.

Oh, that's no bug. That's a will o' the wisp, from Primitive Survival. To my knowledge they don't do anything except look pretty/mysterious; you can't catch them for display and they will despawn after a while. They're just a neat bit of ambience.

Actually...I would check this one. Either go into creative/spectator and look around for a dinosaur, or spawn one of those particular ones in a creative world and see what noises they make. Parasaurolophus and related dinosaurs are thought to make noises similar to trombones and other horns, so that may very well be what you're hearing, if not one of the other dinosaurs.

I think the mod does a great job of providing immersive cues, instead of needing to rely purely on text warnings. That being said, I think for the vanilla game, text warnings should always be an option to go with the environmental cues, that players can toggle on/off. Environmental cues can be easily missed, depending on circumstances, and there are some players that probably need the more blatant text warning in order to avoid getting caught off-guard.

@Narg This is likely cause by Salty & Proto's Temporal Symphony: https://mods.vintagestory.at/temporalsymphony It removes the text warning from temporal storms and replaces it with a camera shake, rust particles, and a rusty screen tint, among other things. I would check your modlist to see if it's installed, as it's the most likely cause. That being said...assuming I'm right, good luck with the storm!

I think your view distance needs to be 300 or better for Dave to appear. Also keep in mind that he does move around, so he won't always be in the same place, and if there's mountains, forest, or other terrain nearby it may be very difficult to spot him even with an appropriate view distance.

Except that player class actually matters in regards to parts of the main story--changing it on a whim would make things more confusing, in regards to continuity. Likewise, your choice of class should be an important choice in regards to how the game plays, and not something that you can just change whenever you feel like it. Setting the class exclusive recipes rule to "false" will allow any class to craft and use any recipe--you can set this configuration either at the world's creation, or by running a command and reloading the world after creating it. I will note though that while the locust-taming ability requires a tuning spear, the ability itself is tied to the Clockmaker class, so that is the one exception to the class-exclusive rule. As noted above, there's already a way to craft anything on any class, so this kind of change isn't needed. As for the Commoner class...yes, it's lackluster, but the main purpose is to be the "vanilla" class for new players, or players that just don't really want to be dealing with extra things in their gameplay. It has no benefits, but it also has no drawbacks, so it's good for just a straightforward game, or learning the gameplay basics and figuring out what kind of playstyle you'd prefer.

Welcome to the forums! It's a gameplay balance thing, same as mushrooms = vegetable, despite actually providing protein as a primary nutrient in real life.

I'm pretty sure that's why the chapter 2 locations are placed so far away--it's not just for narrative, but to keep players from stumbling across them before they've completed chapter 1. The RA is difficult to find without the map, so it's unlikely that the player will just stumble across it(though it has happened); the chapter 2 locations are a lot more noticeable, even from a distance, in some cases. With the longer distances though, it's unlikely that most players will be stumbling across them. That being said...it doesn't really hurt the story if you do chapter 2 before chapter 1. It is possible, and the story still makes sense, although it might get a little confusing meeting a certain "old friend" and whatnot if you've not been to the Archive. That, and it's a shame to miss out on the Archive anyway...really cool place.

Fishies! Now I just need a way to catch them, and an aquarium to put them in so I can collect them all!

I'd like this too. The copper spearheads I typically end up using, at least early game, but the arrowheads I rarely bother with. In the mid-late game? Yeah I'd rather just melt that stuff down and turn it into lanterns or something else that's more useful. That way it's not cluttering up my chests and I can get some value out of it, instead of just tossing it.

Welcome to the forums! Given what one of the devs said on the matter, I doubt we'll see something like this in the vanilla game, at least in regards to more in-depth butchering. Meat smoking though, I could definitely see being added. Link to full comment:

Oh I know If the in-game plate armor was absolutely realistic regarding the movement speed, there'd be absolutely no reason to use any of the other armors in most cases. Could it be better than it is? Probably, but I also don't think it's quite as bad as others say. I agree, plus you can use the elk to stow all your luggage too. You can currently make the entire trip on foot in roughly the same time as it takes on elk, however, you're going to need a LOT more food if you do that given all the energy you'll burn while sprinting. Likewise, if you're on foot, wearing armor will slow you down, but not wearing it makes you much more vulnerable to accidental death.

This is already somewhat a thing--plate armor. The material still determines the equipment tier, however, plate armor specifically is resistant to incoming damage that is one tier higher. So steel plate armor is resistant to tier 5 damage, despite being a tier 4 armor. Likewise, copper plate will resist tier 2 damage, despite being made out of a tier 1 material. Of course, just being resistant to a higher tier attack is not quite as good as matching the tier level of the incoming attack, but it's worth bearing in mind that matching the tier level doesn't mitigate all the damage either, especially from high tier monsters. Players will still need to plan appropriately when engaging such creatures, since they can't rely on just outgearing every encounter.

I don't think it is possible, personally, though I also think that "study YouTube" has perhaps become the unfortunate default for any sort of game challenge in general, not just for Vintage Story. As a result, the moment something gets a little hard, players will go look it up online, instead of putting in a little more time and effort to figure it out themselves. That's not to say that looking things up is bad(I do this frequently), however, I do think that's probably why a lot of videogame features/challenges get complained about if they can't be solved in the first attempt. If I had to choose between the two, I'd opt for balancing around the player actually figuring things out for themselves in the gameplay. The player might make several mistakes and die a few times, but I think that's okay--it's just part of the learning process, provided that the player can easily learn from the mistakes. Vintage Story has done a really good job of balancing in that regard.

Welcome to the forums! Warm climates will cool off in winter, but won't see snow. However, I'd also note that for the default temperate start, there shouldn't be snow on the ground for 7 months either. Snow tends to arrive late November and doesn't start melting off until late March/early April. If you travel very far north or settle at altitude, the weather will be colder, so that could be a factor. The default distance is fine, in my opinion. It really sets the tone for the world and story, and it's a lot easier to take both seriously as a result. However, to my knowledge, the devs already accounted for players wanting to adjust the distances and added an option to do so. Pretty much these, in a nutshell, regarding plate armors. They're very protective, resisting higher tier damage than what other armors in their tier could withstand. However, the trade-off is that you'll be slower and not able to heal as quickly, so you'll need to be a lot more careful with your actions and positioning. I would also say that plate is a much stronger choice in multiplayer overall than in singleplayer, since in multiplayer you can have friends cover for you while you take a moment to heal. In singleplayer, plate is still good for defending your base during a temporal storm, but it's not a great choice for just going out and adventuring given the drawbacks. In all fairness, the village isn't quite finished yet either and some systems are still missing, though that should be getting resolved in 1.21 to my knowledge. It's why you can ask the innkeeper for a room, or the barber-surgeon for a haircut, but can't actually have either. Depends on your settings and playstyle, really. I would say perhaps the most important thing to focus on in the game is food supply, above all else. If you have a handle on your food supply, then everything else comes easily enough in time.

He has different animations depending on which attack he's going to do. The windup on the attacks are fairly slow, so you have a couple of seconds to react to whatever he's about to do. This is my general strategy--there's a sweet spot where you can stay close enough to him that he won't throw a tantrum and pound the ground very often, but just out of range of his swings. It's a delicate dance back and forth, and it's still somewhat a fight of attrition, especially towards the end where you need to effectively burn down the rest of his health bar before you're overwhelmed. I will also note that you can't use that strategy on the second boss. Overall, I'm inclined to agree with what @traugdor and others have said--it sounds like a change meant specifically to make this fight a bit more challenging since it was something of a joke previously. It might need a little more fine-tuning depending on how many players start dying to it after the change, but it's a fight that definitely needed a little love.

https://www.britannica.com/animal/musk-ox Well...I mean, they look like cows, but are more closely related to goats. So it's accurate.

A fair point on the lightning rod being a bad example of solder--I was thinking "videogame mechanics" but I'm not sure that would entirely fit consistently with the other recipes in the game that lean more towards realism(even if it can be a little goofy sometimes). As for being accessible early in the game...I don't think that itself is an issue, given that the materials needed for solder and a soldering iron are fairly easy to find. The chutes are a great idea! You generally need at least a handful, or more if you're going to delve deep into the automation aspect of the game. So that poor soldering iron could finally see some more use instead of being forgotten on the tool rack for eternity.

I would agree here. When I first picked up Vintage Story, I struggled a lot too making the leaps from stone age to copper, and it could be frustrating at times. However, that struggle is the reason why getting those first metal tools(and later upgrades) feels so rewarding; the player has to work at it a bit to get them(but not unfairly so), and the tools open up a lot of gameplay that wasn't really feasible before. The stone age might be pretty basic, but it's supposed to be in order to push the player to progress. That being said, players vary in playstyle preferences, and not everyone enjoys the default. As @Echo Weaver noted, you might consider trying out some mods to alter the portions of gameplay you don't find that fun or find lacking. Aside from mods, you might also try cranking up the ore spawn rates in the world generation tab when first creating the world; doing so will ensure that copper, tin, and other minerals are much easier to find. I'd also throw out Ancient Tools as a mod you might be interested in trying. It adds a lot of useful little things for earlier stages of the game, including an alternate leathermaking process(very useful if you don't have access to lime or borax). For traps and snares, you'll want to look into Primitive Survival, though it adds a lot more than just those things.

Looking at your screenshot, I'd say it's the upper eyelashes/eyelids. On the old face, the rest higher on the eye, giving the eyes a wider, more friendly appearance. On the new faces, the lashes/lids rest lower, so the eyes have a more heavy-lidded bored/snarky/angry expression to them since they aren't opened as wide. That's not the say the eyebrows aren't playing a factor too, but I think adjusting the eyelids first would improve quite a lot.

At a glance, I like the looks of them. The colors seem crisper and there's more subtle detail that wasn't there before. I think the biggest difference is the addition of proper eyelashes, along with a slight rounding of the pupils and adjustment of pupil highlights.