Maelstrom

Look for mods. Devs had stated that firearms will not be part of the base game experience.

No joke! Went through my first medium storm in 1.17 yesterday. The normally flat landscape turned into rolling sea billows as I ran to the safety of my home. Truly awesome! I can see how it can induce severe nausea. Not sure I want to experience a heavy storm.

I can confirm this. I had a pig pen fenced off with internal space of 6 blocks and subdivided into smaller pens of 3 block depth. Had a bear slaughter my three pregnant sows through/over a one fence height. Seems like two tall fencing for animals pens are a thing again, as a second bear has not killed my pigs once I build up the fence to a height of 2 fences. Has bear spawning conditions been reported anywhere? Asking since my homestead built in 1.15 seems to be bear central (have killed 4 in less than a month game time).

I'd expect that 1.17 is now at the point where mods won't be broken by any future patches. Based on my experience Tyron is at the point of cleaning up loose ends and starting work on 1.18. I suspect there's maybe 1 more update, if that.

Upgraded to 1.17.7 about a week ago and bummed that I was assaulted by a bear running between buildings. About 1 game month later a second bear showed up that climbed on my pumpkins and jumped to the roof of my kitchen building which was 3 blocks higher than the pumpkins. I think that same black bear slaughtered my pigs inside a fenced in area.

Almost as important as backpacks, fur clothes for the long cold winter months.

Well, there's just the one developer coding and a part-time assistant coder. Hopefully, the 1.18 story and lore update will have some help on combat as there is rumor that the game's first boss will be introduced.

Acts like a round planet? uhhh.... Not exactly? On default settings there are 2 poles between spawn and the northern world border and 2 poles between spawn and the southern world border. That's very unglobelike behavior for a planet. Speaking of world borders. Should you travel to said Vintage Story geographic location you will see a cliff. Perhaps if you could fly out far enough you'd see elephants supporting the mantle seraphs cannot mine through.

Not a bug. The hammer is required to be in the offhand while using the chisel, making it impossible to also hold a light source.

In granite it is. I found some in claystone recently thinking it was some flint but surprised when the tool tip showed zinc instead.

I'm curious to know what you consider not "that many sticks".

Alls good in the hood. Just wanted to provide awareness of the dev's participation in the forums.

Yes. Leaves break almost instantly with axes.

I'm working my way through a 750 page omnibus I picked up at Costco. Lovely embossed hardcover book with an attached ribbon for bookmark.

It sounds like you think the devs (all 1.5 of them) peruse the forums or discord regularly for ideas. My experience has been that they are, for the most part, absent from either.

Even in your situation branch mining is the worst thing to do. Better to sink shafts in the area with the highest node search readings.

Early game you should be harvesting leaf blocks to generate sticks and seeds. Hint: shears make it much easier.

Harvesting leaf blocks before felling the tree is the game mechanic to create more sticks and seeds than just cutting the tree. It's a good thing since mid to late game there's an over abundance of both sticks and seeds (except for the non-prolific tree seeds i.e. ebony).

And let's not rule out sabotage, even though it is a low likelihood. someone may have had an "Among Us" moment.

This does happen already. A brown block of dirt turns green as grass spreads to it. Secondarily, long grass will grow on it until it is harvested with the Remove function of a scythe, but it will leave a grass block behind.

Yes the handbook has crafting recipes, but the survival guide part of the handbook also explains most, if not all, of the game concepts and mechanics. If anything an in-game "tutorial" of opening the handbook and pointing out the survival guide would all that might be necessary. I wish I had known about (should have looked closer) the survival guides sooner in my gameplay.

Tyron doesn't do anything with the wiki.

And really, REALLY beefy computers to play the game.

Fair 'nuff. I am not worried about potions or even alchemy for the reasons I stated. Tyron and team seem to have an extremely good grasp of Lovecraft's story telling and are doing an exceedingly good job of representing Lovecraft in game. I expect to see science and technology based game content coming up in the 1.18 update.

There's a fun aspect to realism and there's a very UNfun aspect to realism. It's important for the devs to differentiate between the two within the context of the game they (more accurately, he) is making. I think the existing grass mechanics are sufficiently realistic and provide the flexibility to farm or not farm grass as desired. Additionally, this isn't that other block game. There exists path blocks that can be craft to make paths and additional path building mechanics aren't necessary. Everything you describe can be handled through modding in this game.