Please change malbatross to an actual threat

[Mr.Tarunio]

An idea from Glermz is to make fishing the way to spawn him instead of traveling around the world for a new sail and a paddle.

The new sea fishing is a nice add on and it would be great if fishing had the looming threat of something other than a squid also eating the fish infront of one.

[mirrormind]

If a certain amount of caught fish are in a small enough area there's a chance every X amount of time that a Malbatross will spawn and try to eat the fish maybe. So between fish in storage, fish on the ground and fish in player inventories if a certain threshold are present while on the water or near the outer shores in a small area the smell has a chance to attract a Malbatross every however often. And it will destroy structures containing fish or attack players holding fish in order to get to it and eat it. If fish is too niche it could be attracted to cooked foods in general too, since they would also have a distinct smell to them.

Currently I don't see a reason for it to exist. It doesn't do anything, or have any presence, it's so awkward to find yet the reward is relatively forgettable. At least this way it would actually be a threat which adds more to the gameplay, and it would function in a specific way which makes both hunting and avoiding it more comprehensive.

[SonicDen220]

Definitely agreed. The way you find malbatross now is horrible. 

I'm debating if finding malbatross is harder than summoning the fuelweaver. For fuelweaver the RNG isn't bad - The only real thing you have no control over is just finding the correct big tentacle, that's not a problem. Every chess sculpture part is guaranteed on the main land, finding the ruins and the labyrinth isn't difficult when world gen follows a consistent pattern (like ruins being always connected to a muddy biome with a lot of lightbulbs, which also connects to the 3 colored mushroom forests). Fossil fragments aren't rare plus they're guaranteed if you mine spilagmites.

For malbatross RNG is a brutal deciding factor that you have 0 control over. Can be anywhere in the ocean, only 25% of the places where he can spawn can have him at all. And if you don't kill him in 3 days after (somehow) finding him, he's gonna relocate. The ocean is massive, sailing is very slow (and sea stacks make it even slower).

[Charesque]

3 hours ago, mirrormind said:

 And it will destroy structures containing fish or attack players holding fish in order to get to it and eat it.

Please don't. It would be a pain to place tin boxes again on usually cramped with stuff boats, and you can't really avoid Malbatross doing it since the slow speed of a boat.
But other than that, fishing a large amount of deep water fish and thus causing Malbatross to appear and having to fight him is a good idea. Would make sense preparing some armor, because there are no real threats in the ocean right now - even hounds are ignoring you.

[Well-met]

It should come to players, warning-style.

[Bird Up]

Inclined to agree because finding Malbatross is one of the most time consuming and luck based activities you can do. I would like to take on Malbatross as soon as possible for the sweet sail and the feather bobber, but it's so unlikely that I ever find the rare birb. It'd be nice to have a more consistent way to find Malb.

 

[QrChuck]

Strongly agree. Recently i spent 4 hours to find the big birb and I still haven't. I thought it would be awesome, if Malbatross spawns after fishing on the shoal related to it.

[TheKingofSquirrels]

15 hours ago, Well-met said:

It should come to players, warning-style.

I so agree with this.

[Electroely]

My understanding based off the current mechanics is that the Malbatross is a normally peaceful bird. You just come across it feeding on fish and attack it if you'd like. As of Hook, Line & Inker, though, you too can get those fish, so the Malbatross is kind of like competition. You don't want it around when you're fishing because it's probably going to eat the fish.

I think one way to make it more of an annoyance in that matter would be to do the following changes:
- Make the Malbatross wander into a fish shoal if the player(s) spend enough time at one
- Change the fish at the shoals to Deep Bass rather than Black Catfish to further incentivize players to fish at the shoals (Deep Bass are probably the easiest large fish to catch, so I think they're the best to look for).

You'd be able to get a lot of fish from fish shoals that way, but after some time the Malbatross will come to that shoal and keep eating up all the fish until you get rid of it. I think it should be time based rather than based on whether you fish at the shoal or not because the Malbatross probably doesn't have a way of knowing if you're fishing at a certain shoal. If it's time based, there could be the implication that it just wandered there just to eat like it usually does rather than specifically come for the player.

I'm personally against making anything too intrusive, that's why I think the Malbatross should be restricted to fish shoals only rather than it coming to players as others in the thread have suggested. I also don't think it should initiate combat without being attacked by the player first: having a chance to be forced into a boss fight every time I go fishing would lead me personally to just avoid the risk of fishing altogether and continue using the other methods of obtaining food that are in the game.

[lakhnish]

5 hours ago, Electroely said:

- Make the Malbatross wander into a fish shoal if the player(s) spend enough time at one
- Change the fish at the shoals to Deep Bass rather than Black Catfish to further incentivize players to fish at the shoals (Deep Bass are probably the easiest large fish to catch, so I think they're the best to look for).

^I'm in 100% support of this.

Black Catfish is a rather difficult fish to catch, and since the shoals respawn Black Catfish, the main reason I'd go the the shoals that can spawn Malbatross is for Malbatross, not the fish.

If it was Deep Bass, it'd be more enjoyable.

[Atkvin]

Not quite sure how it'd work but maybe a plume could spawn in shoals (signifying the bird was feeding there recently) that you could fish up to follow the direction it points in like a Koalefant dirt pile system?

Also, I feel a telescope item would be something great to add given the survivors don't see the world top-down like we do and it should be much easier for them to at least hint the presence of a huge bird or island in a direction to the player by scouting with a telescope.

[TheKingofSquirrels]

Maybe when you're on the ocean, instead of hound attacks, you get a malbatross attack?

Maybe that's TOO frequent, but maybe a system could be developed. 

 

[O_Atoba_Azul]

Well, your wish has been granted on the Hook, line and Inker beta!

[Mime]

On 11/16/2019 at 9:07 AM, jantonio said:

An idea from Glermz is to make fishing the way to spawn him instead of traveling around the world for a new sail and a paddle.

The new sea fishing is a nice add on and it would be great if fishing had the looming threat of something other than a squid also eating the fish infront of one.

haha good one

[X-lem]

On 11/16/2019 at 9:07 AM, jantonio said:

An idea from Glermz is to make fishing the way to spawn him instead of traveling around the world for a new sail and a paddle.

The new sea fishing is a nice add on and it would be great if fishing had the looming threat of something other than a squid also eating the fish infront of one.

But you can spawn her from fishing...

"The Malbatross also has a 10% to spawn when a player hooks a Deep Bass."

https://dontstarve.fandom.com/wiki/Malbatross

[QrChuck]

12 minutes ago, X-lem said:

But you can spawn her from fishing...

"The Malbatross also has a 10% to spawn when a player hooks a Deep Bass."

https://dontstarve.fandom.com/wiki/Malbatross

This thread was made before this update