EnbyKaiju

Yeah, that's what I'd heard too, regarding the labels. The screenshot they used looked great. And yeah, when I was talking about treating them the same way as trees I meant like doing cuttings. Maybe you only get a couple from each bush before it has to grow them back. And there's a chance they don't take. Honestly I'd much rather have to grow my own berry plantation over time than see an area stripped of all the berry bushes so someone can have a massive berry field. I still hope that one day we'll get to put saplings in planters. Maybe not to grow fruit (or maybe the fruit you do get you only get like, one apple from an apple sapling in a pot), but I'd love to have a little cherry tree in a planter and see it blossom in the spring. Though maybe that's because I've done both blueberry & strawberry picking as summer jobs before, the extra effort makes the berries all the sweeter.

If they start treating berry bushes like fruit tress we'll likely see climate-specific growth ability, so it'll be interesting. Maybe a greenhouse would be enough to grow more of the warmer-climate berries, and you'd have to grow the colder climate ones on mountains. Either way I'm keen to learn. At worst you could travel to wherever the berries are, make the jam there & seal it, then high-tail it back home again. A cunning Seraph always finds a way to fill their larder. On the up side, if they do actually make cold-weather berries that grow in tundra (which it looks like a few IRL are the kind that do), then we'll actually see them in snowball earth runs. Which would be rad.

We've got fruit, we've got bread, it's only a matter of time before the VS devs give us the ultimate survival foodstuff: Fruitcake!!! Judging by the sheer number of changed berry types in the experimental build I'm pretty sure the berry rework will be making it out this update. It's one of the ones they have been really keen to build on and I'm super keen to get a little more challenge & planning in to my berry harvests. Also being able to find different berry types in different climates. I'm gonna end up with an entire pantry full of different kinds of berry jam, and I can't wait!!

It's absolutely part of game development (speaking from years in games journalism/development). When devs see players finding exploits they have two options: either find ways to mitigate those exploits so that it doesn't detract from the experience they wanted to make, or indulge the exploits and leave them in. In which case they become features. The latter you often see end up in the speedrunning community. Though personally I don't like the idea of VS as something to speedrun, but each to their own. The VS devs seem to like to skirt a line between taking out the exploits/cheesing mechanics that make the game too easy or metagameable, and encouraging folks to play in their own way. We see that a lot in how the game customisation allows for a lot of things that the devs might not consider their way of doing things. The Project Zomboid devs do the same thing. That's why these are sandbox games where you get to determine a lot of factors. Sometimes you'll find mechanics that the devs definitely don't want to you to exploit (e.g. the story elements), in which case I say just let the devs cook and see what they turn up. If they think something is broken, and they get feedback to that extent, they will decide if it's worth changing. But for Dave's sake, be polite about it. We've enough games out there where the devs walk away because people scream at them or make the fanbase hostile. We don't need more of that. I sure as heck wouldn't want to see it happen to VS. Speak your thoughts, consider that everyone plays differently, and encourage things you think might help change the game for the better without being overly critical. That's just my perspective of someone having seen this kind of thing go on many, many times.

That's my take on it too. I've been working with that understanding since they introduced the no infinite water block creation option, and it makes for a great additional challenge (and also prevents metagaming/min-maxing). With the introduction of so many more elevation-based water sources my hope is that the VS team start giving us new ways to do irrigation. As at the moment I'm stuck using irrigation mods to make something that feels both realistic and works with the current mechanics. I think once they eventually get rivers working right, and we get a proper water table it'll work out a lot better for what they have been planning.

Look on the map for any circular depressions in the ground. The more it looks like a perfect circle about 5-7 blocks across the more likely you've got a meteor crater. Once you start noticing the patterns you'll find them everywhere. Deserts are the best place to start looking because there aren't trees getting in the way.

I would be very happy to see even a scaled down version of what Expanded Foods gives us. The basics are in there of a Northern European diet of the middle ages (pies, roast meat, bread, wine, preserves, cheese), and that's a great starting point. But I'd love to see at least small additions over future updates. Not just variety of what we already have (all the new berries will be amazing to have once the berry bush mechanics are updated), but additions of period appropriate foods from different cultures. Especially since the game lore already acknowledges a level of interaction with those cultures. For example, we've got rice, and a variety of tasty ingredients, so why not let us make jam donuts? (for those of us old enough to get the reference), I mean rice balls. I'm not asking for potatoes or anything, but the earliest pasta dishes date back into the BCE years. That's something to use up extra eggs and all that extra flour. Maybe make jellies using all those spare bones, as an additional way to preserve fruit & veges in not as much a diminished state. None of these would require additional materials or cooking equipment. I know updated cooking is on the roadmap, but little additions would be cool. Heck, we're already getting cooking fish whole in the new one. That's something new, and I'll happily take it :)

Absolutely agree. I'm old enough to remember the forum flame wars of old, and how folks wouldn't take the time to think their responses out before coming down on opinions. The difference between the two definitely shows up in that difference of time-scale, with discord being extremely fast-paced if just for the sheen number of people talking at once. There's always 20 people talking at a time, with about 10 different subjects going on, in one channel, and it can get rough at times. It's a very reactionary world we live in, and I think folks could do with taking a little time to smell the flowers and consider their approach to things You're definitely one of the familiar faces I appreciate seeing around, LadyWYT. Nice to have other folks around who take things a little slower.

Just wanted to reach out and say a big thank you, both to the amazing VS team, and the wonderful people in this forum. I'm both here and the discord server and I've found the server to be far too busy, often chaotic, and sometimes a hostile place to exist. To the point where I keep every channel except the devlogs muted. But every interaction here I've had has been wonderful and I've started to recognize familiar faces that I always know bring considered opinions and a kind word that makes this space far more welcoming. In time I could easily see myself becoming fast friends with a bunch of you. Maybe it's just that I grew up on forums, and that really busy spaces like discord can be overstimulating, but this space feels like far more of a home that embraces what I love about VS and the community. So thank you, to the VS team for providing this space (and the incredible game we all love to play & talk about), and to the lovely folks that share it with me. Y'all make me grateful to be part of this wonderful community. Keep building, keep having fun, and stay safe out there

The insulating block tip doesn't always appear, in my experience. It can be kind of frustrating at times when doing chisel work. What I would recommend doing is using the command "/debug rooms hi" (can't remember if it's "room" or "rooms" to check if the space you've made counts as a room. That'll usually show up red where it doesn't count as a block. I've had to do that a bunch in the past and it's how I found out chiselling the inside face can really mess things up at times. Chiselling glass definitely does leave you with a block that counts though, if you've got the correct face solid. I found that out when making greenhouses so I think with a bit of trial and error you should find a way to make it work. Just do one block at a time till you know what you're doing works for the build style you're making.

The last windmill I made for a longer term world was part of a larger workshop build I was trying, with a layout inspired by the design style of Kingdoms Reborn. There are definitely some improvements that could be made, especially with the axel-in-blocks that are coming in the new update, but this felt like it worked well for what I was trying to do and adds to the layered effect I absolutely love to work with and see from others. I try and keep my mechanical setup very simple. One windmill, with as little mechanical complexity as possible, and this one work very nicely for a solo experience.

I don't do full builds in creative, but I do test building techniques & material palettes. Usually if I see something cool in the real world, or when watching a movie and think that might be fun to try down the line I'll mock-up the basic principles in creative and go from there. It really helps since the worlds I tend to like to build on most are where it's 90% ocean, so there's a lot of time dedicated to finding materials, so I have to be sure that the thing I want actually works first. It also lets me play with mods to decide if I want to bring them into the game or not. As a result my creative world is a mish-mash of ideas taken from all-over. I'm really looking forward to pushing forward with my Japanese castle town build in the next update, so as a result I've got part-built things that will give me a place to start that and give me an overall idea of scale I'll need to be working with. e.g. how big do I want the castle? What are the best ways to do streets & walls? Does this lighthouse work vs this one? Can I stick to the Edo period style, or do I need to move up to the Meiji period to give me what I need for this idea? A bonus of doing it this way I've found is that I can get a general idea of the space I need, both internal and external. So when I get around to building it in the actual game I can have a lot more freedom of layouts, and enjoy working all the pieces together. In the end Vintage Story is played how you want to play it. But take it at your pace. Everything will look blocky to start with, it's a block game, but it's where you take it afterwards that matters. Shoom made a very good point too; focus on the survival, and as you go just keep tinkering until it all feels right. VS is a long-term game, not meant to be rushed, allow yourself that time to make something that feels right to you. And if it doesn't work out? You just learned something for the next build. Have fun with it all, and don't try and compare yourself to others. We all play, and create art, in our own ways //content.invisioncic.com/r268468/emoticons/smile.png

Haha, that's a big mood. Thankfully (or not) there aren't actually that many books in the game. I think there's only a couple of shelves worth. So if you're open to suggestions maybe have sections of the library devoted to books, and use the rest as a big Museum of Ages. Have a mineralogy/gemology section, a geology section, historic artifacts...etc. You could even do something like have a little archives room where you keep a record of all the different exhibits and where you found them. Feeling very inspired by what you're doing here. It has the vibes of a forever world in the making, and I can't wait to see how it develops over the months/years. Keep it up!

This is absolutely gorgeous! You've done an incredible job making it in survival. I love the adobe-style structures, a really nice change from the European style that is the norm. I'm sure once the next build comes out and you can replace some of those shelves with the cabinets that hold all kinds of things you can do even more with it! Not just books but shelves full of mineral exhibits & relics from the past. 10/10 design work here, and it looks like you've done most of, if not all, of it in vanilla, which deserves even more applause. A builder after my own heart

To give it a little extra flair I'd suggest maybe leaving the ground floor as is and making the next level out sightly wider, then bringing it in again the next level up. So that it bulges a little in the middle before narrowing towards the roof. It'll both give you extra room on the main floor, and give you more window space, but also add some visual depth to the build as a whole. Shifts in proportions help builds feel less static & lego-y, but I really love how you've started this out.

This is so hecking cute! I love the expression! I wish VS would allow you to channel water through narrow holes in blocks. You could make a whole lot of classic gargoyles that drain water out their mouths (gargoyles were originally gutter drains, grotesques were the stand-alone statues but the names have become kinda interchangable over the centuries). This is giving me inspiration to do a whole series of gargoyle statues based off the 90's Gargoyles show //content.invisioncic.com/r268468/emoticons/biggrin.png

The way I see it optimisation should never be the end goal of Vintage Story, the strive to min-max everything makes it feel too much like minecraft. Just enjoying the flow of the game and taking it in a way that feels natural to you. Having a little building set aside for each thing and making it feel real is a great way to do that. I can't wait too see the future incarnations of your little town and the builds that come next!

So much love and care has gone into all these designs, I really love them! I love how considered each space is to feel used and alive.

I love a good lighthouse build in VS, a game that very much encourages them. And this, it's a damn good lighthouse. Nice work. You picked the perfect spot for it to, I love how shaped to the outcrop it is.

Rainbow house!! It looks so cute!

Snowball earth runs are a fantastic challenge that I'd highly recommend if just because it teaches you how to do more with less. Most of your standard resourses are coming out of storage vessels, no real trader access, and most of your food supply will be meat. And you'll never find a better way to perfect the art of spear-throwing. Temperature wise the way Vintage Story handles it is that the further you are from the equator the greater the shift in yearly temperature. So while winters can get down to -40c+ (I think the worst I had was -50c, you get maybe 10 minutes outside before you freeze to death), the height of summer will go up to about 10c. Not great, but plenty to grow most cold-weather crops. I hope you like rye bread, haha. If you make greenhouses you can give yourself a little extra room to grow. I've even grown rice, but you have to be real good with your timing to get it to last the full growing cycle. The old "I spent 100 days in a snowball earth" youtuber trick used to be to grow all the stuff underground where it's warmer. But VS devs added an option to stop that being a thing by default and I agree with it. Mushroom farming underground I'd be cool with, but not the crops that need sunlight. A word of warning. It is the kind of challenge where you're probably going to die a lot. If not to the cold, or the hunger, then the polar bears who are waiting behind every snow drift. So be kind to yourself and maybe leave keep inventory on death on. It'll save you wanting to rage quit when you're having to travel thousands of blocks across glaciers to find your stuff. Good luck! And if you have any other questions feel free to ask

After about 210 hours spent in this long dark apocalypse I think I'm finally ready to close this chapter of my adventures. This was about 2 full in-game years with 20 day months (which made for very long, dark winters), on wilderness survival which was...a real challenge. There's only really so much that I could find to do on a snowball earth though, with so few biomes & seasons to work with, so it was never going to be a forever world. That is probably going to be for when the next update drops and I can finally let loose with all the ideas I've been planning up. But I'm really proud of what I accomplished here. Most of the story elements done aside from the very end. I reached the equator, both on foot and by elk, to find the last remnants of humanity to trade with. I've steel, sturdy leather, and all the mechanical power I could need. Domesticated livestock and enough food & ale in my pantry to keep my belly full. And a cozy castle keep built atop a basalt outcropping in the middle of a frozen lake that I fight off the eldritch monsters that come for me from my nightmares. If there is such a thing as thriving in an endless winter, I've made it there. Thank you, Vintage Story devs, for giving me something I could throw myself into when real life is such a struggle. And thanks to this wonderful community for always sharing kind words and feedback & demonstrating that the fandom for this game is the best around. I wouldn't still be here without this game enjoy. for that I'll always be grateful From my snow-topped castle at the North Pole, this will be my final log on this stage of my journey. Winter is fun to visit, but I wouldn't recommend living here -Kaiju

That is a gorgeous build! I love how organic and lived in it all feels. Has a very "a lone sole discovered the ruins and built their forever home from it" vibe.

I'm loving your small build designs, they are lovely! Vintage Story is thankfully far better designed for small builds than Minecraft is. You can get an impressive amount of stuff into quite a small house, and it really does feel like a game designed to encourage you to build smaller but denser builds than epic scale ones (though they can be cool too). Depending on the kind of world I'm playing I vary between one big build and a small town, both have their advantages, so stick to what makes you happy

A fantastic start for a new player! It looks like you've really taken the strengths of the game to heart and made something that feels cozy and happy for you. Hope you share many more of your builds in the coming years