GeekFather

My impression is that it is intentional to push you into automation and getting a helve hammer up and running.

Do you still have a crude door? Or open spots for windows? I'm pretty sure that and plenty of light effects making a room secured from spawns if you are away. I also make pit traps outside my doors with a trap door so most just fall in alowing me to stabby stab with a spear and collect extra linen for the inventory sacks early game. Not an expert only been playing a month, but Plenty of starts and stops rerolling worlds trying to figure out world gen options and only one main world with 15 hours of game play. (After a dismal first world of 10 hours) terrain was way to up and down. With were I spawned with normal world options.

What if I made my house out of glass?

People in trades and craftspeople in general have their favorite tool(s) they fix them when damaged. Throwing things away and getting a new one is more a modern outlook on things. Look how often people upgrade their cell phones. Not because the old one stopped working. Just that the new one is "better" or it's a status/flex thing. I've been playing video games for the better part of 35 years. I've never minded tools that degrade as long as you have the ability to repair them. Ones that go poof after a certain amount of uses is bad mechanics to me. I get it's easy to just get a new one. It's just not satisfying nor is it remotly realistic to have a tool last less than a day of use in game. (Im talking iron and above tools. ) If tools degrade this quickly then this could be said for most of the light sources. Candles burn down and go out so they need replaced in your lanterns. The sails on the windmills get worn and tattered and again need replaced. Ive been around and talked to plenty of crafts people. More than half of them have their grandfather's tools and use them regularly. I still have my grandfather's wood lathe as well as the chisels. As to not wanting to build "Notre Dame" that's fine and also why this game and games with similar crafting are great. Everyone can enjoy it the way they want. One part of maintenance would be the use of oil or fat to keep iron and above from rusting. That's a renewable but costly endeavor until you get a good animal farm up and running, Or a seed press gets added in to get oil. As a compromise between the two sides of this, the devs could institute a repair limit. 5 to 10 times. Just spitballing.

I have to agree with OP. For a game that emphasizes certain things, like leather, crop rotations, cheese, weather, ect but ignored others like tool maintenance feels a bit off. Stone tools break plain and simple. So should be left the way they are. Softer metals like copper and bronze should need to be re-forged if they break. Or not. They could just be a stepping stone to iron but that's where things should probably change. Iron tools and above should need re-handled, sharpened and maybe refaced in the case of a hammer. I think at least a sharpening kit would help for some field repairs. Up the durability of hammers. Have a powered grinding wheel for things like chisels and blades to sharpen at home. There are plenty of mods that do these but none do it perfectly or are close but not updated. These are just my meandering thoughts on this aspect of the game. Maybe disregard anything below Iron and leave it the way it is but once you get Iron it should feel huge. Right now the tools are just a bit faster with a bit more durability.

Besides light levels, building your house in a temporarly stable area should matter. Just like if it is temporarly un-stable results in more spawns. It would make this mechanic even more important.